


Where the Broken Ends Meet

by TheCorrosivePen



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Canon Divergence After 6th Year, Chronic Pain, Death Eater Draco Malfoy, Depression, Despair, Dubious Consent, Equally Traumatized Draco Malfoy, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Fighting for a Better World, Heavy Angst, Legilimency, Manipulative Gellert Grindelwald, Manipulative Tom Riddle, Occlumency, Possessive Tom Riddle, Post-Hogwarts, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Scars of War, Slow Burn, Slow Romance, This shit gets heavy okay?, Time Turner (Harry Potter), Truamatized Hermione Granger, War, War Veteran Hermione Granger, Wartime, dramione - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:07:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 46
Words: 102,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23936587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCorrosivePen/pseuds/TheCorrosivePen
Summary: In which Tom Riddle is a charming, manipulative mastermind, Draco Malfoy's hands are soaked in blood and Hermione Granger can't remember a life beyond suffering.Or the Time Turner fix-it attempt that goes horribly awry. With all hope lost, Hermione turns to desperate measures to rid the world of Voldemort and his crimes, but she doesn't count on a Death Eater hitching a ride to the past or her target being quite so alluring.At its heart this is Dramione, but it's a hell of a slow burn.Complete!
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy, Hermione Granger/Tom Riddle
Comments: 730
Kudos: 632





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all, so glad you've stopped by. I've been working on this since August 2019, so you could say it's been a long time coming. The current pandemic has given me the time to finish, so here it is. I wish it could be under better circumstances.
> 
> This is a dark story, but not so dark that all hope is lost. I tried to emphasize the different facets of love/lust (as explained well in the poem at the beginning) and to show how deep the trauma of war can cut. The characters here are all shades of grey. Characters actions and choices may not always be as they seem and I ask you to keep an open mind and to remember that narrators can be unreliable. There are sections with dubious consent that some may find upsetting. Warnings exist appropriately at the beginning of any of these sections.
> 
> As I say in the summary, this is Dramione. That said, the relationship between Tom Riddle and Hermione plays a major role in this story and can't be ignored. 
> 
> I hope you'll give it a try. Much love in these troubled times, The Corrosive Pen
> 
> Hey and I created this:  
> 
> 
>   
> 

Where the Broken Ends Meet

_"Love seeketh not itself to please,_

_Nor for itself hath any care,_

_But for another gives its ease,_

_And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair.”_

_So sung a little Clod of Clay_

_Trodden with the cattle's feet,_

_But a Pebble of the brook_

_Warbled out these metres meet:_

_"Love seeketh only self to please,_

_To bind another to its delight,_

_Joys in another's loss of ease,_

_And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite."_

-William Blake, The Clod and the Pebble

~*~ One ~*~

It was over.

They had been on the brink of total annihilation for months, but it was well and truly over now. Hermione’s breath was a ragged pant as she reached the top of the Astronomy Tower stairs, her tattered and bloody robes billowing behind her in the chill fall breeze. It was barely dawn, the inky tendrils of night still clinging to the sky, but the battle had been raging since the previous twilight, the final push of the Death Eaters to finish off the Order. The air was laden with ozone and blood, the vestiges of spells best left unknown.

Hermione took a steadying breath as she reached into her pocket, pulling out the miniature hourglass attached to the delicate chain. It had been burning a hole in her side for months now, ever since she managed to nick it during a ministry raid. But it hadn’t been warranted. They’d lost so much, but it hadn’t been over. Not like it was now.

Her hands trembled as they draped the chain about her neck and gripped the slender hourglass. This was utter desperation; the last resort of last resorts. But it was over and now there was no other choice, no other path toward salvation. No, there was only a trail of sightless eyes and loss so infinite it filled every corner of her soul making her ache in ways she couldn’t begin to describe. So she spun the hourglass in its frame, carefully counting the rotations. Too many and she’d risk jumping through time forever, too few and it wouldn’t matter.

A blast of green illuminated the stairway followed by the telltale thump of a body toppling down the remaining stairs. Heavy footsteps echoed as the victor continued the trip up the tower. Hermione didn’t take her eyes off the spinning vial of sand as she backed away from the stairs. There was no stopping now no matter who emerged. Her finger caught the hourglass as it finished its final rotation.

An instant later a silver mask was in front of her as strong arms tugged her against a solid, very male frame. His robes were stained with blood and gore, the stench enough to induce nausea in the feint of heart. But Hermione no longer noticed the smell, no longer felt the urge to purge everything within her at the sight of bile and flesh.

There had been a time, years ago now, that she’d vomited for days on end, that she’d been overwhelmed by the realities of battle. But three years of war had stolen such sensitivities from her. They’d also stolen Ron and Ginny. It had barely been a year into the war when Ginny had fallen, cut down by some masked figure merely doing his duty to the enemy. Harry, Hermione and Ron had raged, turning the loss into something visceral to fight with. But that had only lost Ron to a burst of green as well. Indeed, the green glow of the Killing Curse no longer caused her pulse to race or her chest to tighten. It was simply another reality of war, merely a green light that signaled another drop of life into a well of eternal death.

After Ginny and Ron passed, the well just kept filling. The faces she’d seen at school gradually thinned until Hermione knew only a handful of the people she fought beside. Even the enemy evolved, fewer Death Eater’s voices eliciting the sting of recognition. Life became a struggle, a bottle of Firewhiskey and the moans on Harry’s lips as he buried himself within her over and over until neither of them could remember Ginny or Ron.

But she’d seen Harry fall, minutes ago, as he stood between a horde of masks and the battlements of the castle. She’d seen his body tip over the edge, a lifeless bird as it tumbled to the ground, rustling the fallen leaves below. It was over.

The Death Eater’s grip on her tightened as the world began to spin. There was a rough pull at the chain around her neck and then the loop extended about his broad shoulders as well. Hermione would have protested, put up at least of modicum of a fight, but the risk was too great. The timing was precise and she could ill afford to ruin this last, desperate hope. So instead she stood stiff as a board, ignoring the burn of her skin where he pressed up against her. When they arrived, she would deal with him.

The world stopped rotating at a blistering pace in an instant. Hermione swayed on her feet a long moment before sense returned and she quickly yanked the Time Turner over their necks, nearly tearing the delicate chain in her haste to conceal it from her stowaway. Only once the delicate hourglass was safely in her robe pocket did she spring into action. Her shoulder crashed into his sternum with a thump that had her wincing and him falling back a step. Her elbow was next, cracking across his chin and forcing his mask askew. She yanked the offending object away with her free hand, flinging it to the ground.

Her hand froze on its path to her wand when the features in front of her finally coalesced. Her pulse skipped a beat, then another, as familiar eyes the color of angry December skies stared back at her. His jaw was sharper than she remembered, but in away that complimented the high cheekbones and full lips above. Hair that managed to still look sinfully soft hung in dirty tendrils, just brushing the line of his jaw. Streaks of red and brown hid much of the distinctive of platinum, but Hermione knew exactly what color it would appear without the grime.

Holding her gaze, Malfoy shed his outer robe, the Death Eater garment that had been coated in nothing but charred flesh and fresh blood. He dropped it unceremoniously on top of the mask she’d discarded. Hermione couldn’t hold back the flinch as his wand slipped down from a forearm holster, but he didn’t point it at her. Rather, a quick flick and the clothing on the stone erupted into flame, the metal of the mask contorting as the fabric below burned.

They stood in total silence until the robes were no more, even the stench of death gone. Malfoy’s features were inscrutable as he asked, “When the bloody hell are we, Granger?”

“1943.”

Malfoy repeated the date under his breath, a storm gathering behind tempestuous eyes as the pieces fell together. She’d always secretly admired his ability to problem solve, to come up with clever solutions when he thought his fellow Slytherins weren’t watching. But now, now that sharp intellect was staring at her with all the horror their situation warranted. “We’re at Hogwarts in 1943. I assume you are perfectly aware of who else resides in this castle at this time.”

Hermione didn’t even blink as she nodded. “Yes. That was rather the point.”

“And what exactly are you planning to do?”

She didn’t need to answer him; didn’t need to explain her plan to a man who was a notorious Death Eater. But he was also the only other human being that knew who she was here. Was it wrong that the appearance of his cold eyes and marble features had filled her with relief before decaying into dread? He was not a friend, not even an ally, but neither was he a stranger. They’d lived together for six years in this castle and she knew him, perhaps not the man he’d become, but the boy he’d been.

“I plan to destroy him using whatever means necessary.”

Malfoy blinked slowly as if he couldn’t quite believe the words coming out of her mouth. “Have you lost your bloody mind?”

“It’s been three years of war, Malfoy. Do you still have yours?” Between the constant death, the inexorable use of the Killing Curse and the slow decay of her soul, Hermione was running on fumes. She was serious when she’d told Malfoy whatever means necessary. Her life hardly mattered now, its light long since snuffed out. She would find a way to set the world right and then she would be done, able to melt away from the pain until nothing remained and she was free at last. What the world did with that second chance would not be her concern, for if Hermione had learned one thing over the past three years, it was that destruction was inevitable and there were no such things as the good guys, only a million shades of gray that tortured the soul.

Malfoy stared down at his left leg for a long moment, as if peering into an abyss only he could see, before nodding. “I suppose not. But that doesn’t explain why you’re doing this. It’s a suicide mission at best.”

“There is the possibility of returning. It’s not well documented, going so far each time, but it’s not impossible either.” She sighed, running a hand through tangled tresses. “But it’s over, Malfoy. You were there. You know. The only way to save them is to change this, eliminate him from the equation.”

“To save Saint Potter you mean.” If his eyes had been stormy skies before, they were jagged icicles now. “Rumor has it Potter’s been shagging your brains out every night for the past two years, Granger. Can’t live without a good fuck, is that it?”

The blood in her veins froze for an instant in the wake of his cruel disdain before heating to a fever pitch, roiling beneath her skin. “Shut up, Malfoy. You have no idea what you’re talking about it.”

His lips pulled up in a smirk that was damningly familiar, a refined version of the one she’d endured for years within these halls. “So it is true. You’re nothing but Potter’s whore. It’s a shame about him dying and all… not sure what use you’ll be to the world now.”

That she’d been prepared to give him a chance, to perhaps even allow him a part in her mission seemed absurd now. How had she forgotten the viciousness behind those crystalline eyes?

Her wand was digging into his throat before she even thought about moving. Hermione watched his pulse hammer against the wood, but he gave no outward sign of distress.

“Do not, for one bloody moment, think you know anything about my life, you vile cockroach.” She dug the wand deeper until he was forced to swallow, until his breathing wasn’t quite as even as it had been. “Just because you got on your knees for Voldemort doesn’t mean the rest of us were such cowards.”

Malfoy’s hand closed around her wand and in one quick twist of his wrist it tore away from her fingers. Her heart stuttered as he moved fully into her, his breath hot against her prickling skin. “Listen very carefully, Granger. I am not the boy you once knew. Perhaps you aren’t the pathetic girl anymore either. It doesn’t matter. Do not ever threaten me again. You’re woefully ignorant of who I am and of what I am capable.”

A throat cleared in the doorway and suddenly her wand was back in her hand with Malfoy a respectable distance away. Hermione watched those brittle silver eyes crack into a million shards of glass and she knew. She knew who stood behind her, what cerulean eyes alight with hypnotic twinkles awaited her.

Hermione turned, not giving herself the chance to retreat from this man who had once meant so much to her. In the years of war, the endless struggle to make the good side win, she’d discovered much about Albus Dumbledore. The most important of which was he was no good man at all. Oh, he was good for the cause, loyal to the defeat of Voldemort at every turn, but that was different than being a good man. He’d used them, Harry most of all, to fight a seemingly unstoppable evil. And it had been the right call, for the greater good, for the fate of the wizarding world. But hardly for Harry, Ron or Hermione. It had taken years of bloody strife, the deaths of Ron and Ginny, for Harry and Hermione to come to this uncomfortable conclusion. They’d both believed in him so bloody much that realizing he’d been a man of flaws, so utterly banal in the end, had been like ripping the foundation away from a building, leaving it teetering in mid-air. Everything they’d believed had shattered after that, destroying whatever worldview they’d had left from their childhood.

Yet she couldn’t bring herself to be angry with the man who stood in front of her, not this version of him or the version that would die on this very tower 54 years later. Hermione understood now what it meant to put the world first, to use others to achieve impossible aims. It was repulsive and yet inescapable when the stakes were so very high. When infinite war was the cost.

“There was a disturbance in the wards.” Dumbledore’s keenly intelligent stare swept over Hermione and then Malfoy. “I believe I have found its source. It is highly unusual to be able to arrive within these castle walls. The wards do not allow apparation or portkey entrances.”

Hermione nodded. She was prepared for this conversation. “True, Professor, but perhaps we have not come from outside the castle walls.”

Malfoy shifted beside her, moving his weight fully toward his right side as Dumbledore approached them. His beard was mostly brown, only streaked with a hint of silver, but his eyes were as she remembered, sharp as jagged glass behind his half-moon spectacles.

“Your attire is most unconventional,” Dumbledore offered after making a slow circle about them. And in 1943 it surely was. She was wearing tight fitting jeans with scuffed black combat boots. Her black sweater was slightly more apt, but still cut to reflect a different sensibility. Malfoy was better off, his gore splattered charcoal slacks and black button-down timeless in comparison. If Dumbledore had noticed the pile of ash smeared across the stone where Malfoy’s other clothes had burned, he hadn’t shown it.

“Our mission is rather unconventional.” Now the gamble began. Hermione’s heart nearly thumped out of her chest as she stared deliberately into curious blue eyes.

“This isn’t going to work, you bloody moron,” Malfoy hissed under his breath. She could feel the full force of his disapproval prickling against her skin, but didn’t spare him a second glance.

“What isn’t going to work?”

Malfoy had enough sense not to reply to the professor’s query. “He’s worried about the integrity of our mission. It is a delicate matter concerning a resident of this castle.”

Dumbledore continued to survey them silently for a long moment before something shifted deep within his gaze. “It is irregular, but not unheard of that the ministry would require such business be conducted within the castle walls. There are several clear difficulties I foresee. The first is that you and your companion are clearly no longer of school age.”

“Our own schooling was disrupted by the Muggle war and the exploits of Grindelwald in the South of France. We’re looking to complete our education at wizarding school that hasn’t been ravaged by either of these forces.”

Dumbledore’s lips pursed. “And how exactly is your French?”

“Pour mon cas il n’y aurait aucun soucis; j’ai grandi en parlant français. Par contre, en ce qui concerne ma chère compagnonne incapable, eh bien... Je peux seulement vous suggérer de lui trouver quelque autre origine. C’est une cause perdue.” The words rolled off Malfoy’s tongue like melted butter and it occurred to Hermione that he truly was fluent, or something close. She’d never heard him speak French before, but there’d been rumors of the Malfoy family vacationing there during their Hogwarts years. And he was right, from what little she could understand of his reply. Her French was terrible, but Grindelwald hadn’t ravaged the continent anywhere else yet, so it was the best story out of a slew of awful ones.

“Perhaps a cousin who was visiting you in France when the occupation began?” It was clear Dumbledore was certain she would not pass for a French girl.

Malfoy’s mouth contorted grotesquely for a moment before he managed to growl, “We are not, nor shall we ever be, related. Fictionally or truly and that is non-negotiable.”

Hermione didn’t particularly appreciate the disgust gleaming behind brittle silver, but she shared the sentiment. Malfoy may have played along thus far, but there was no way either of them could pretend to be kin. Just the thought of having to look at him as if he were family made her skin crawl.

“He’s right. We can just say I was on vacation when Grindelwald began his attack, visiting relatives who are all dead now.” That was closer to the truth than anything. All of Hermione’s loved ones were dead. The thud of Harry’s body hitting the dirt below echoed through her memory, sending a fresh wave of horror cascading beneath her skin.

Dumbledore’s brow furrowed, a sympathetic glint entering his sparkling stare. “There is much death in these terrible times.” He turned to Malfoy. “This brings me to the next issue. You bear a striking resemblance to one of my current students in Slytherin house. I would recommend making some sort of non-magical alteration to prevent this from becoming obvious to all.”

“Abraxas,” Malfoy murmured.

“Indeed.” Dumbledore took a long moment surveying Malfoy, but the blonde didn’t volunteer any further information. With a world-weary sigh, the professor turned away from them. “There is a set of spare rooms at the base of this tower, reserved for guests. I would advise you to clean the death off of you and make appropriate changes to your appearance. The sorting ceremony will be held at six sharp in the Great Hall, in which you will both be expected to participate. I will inform Headmaster Dippet of your arrival, but not give any more details than required. I sincerely hope you know what you’re doing, Miss Granger.”

Hermione could hardly keep the smile from tugging her lips as Dumbledore began to descend the stairs. It had worked. She’d done her best to offer eye contact whenever possible, but there had been no guarantee that Dumbledore would take the bait. Indeed, the naïve Hermione of her Hogwarts years would have been dismayed with the alacrity Dumbledore had shown in plundering her mind, but the war veteran had been counting on it.

She could feel the tension radiating from Malfoy as he moved to stand beside her. “How much does the bloody old coot know, Granger?”

Hermione allowed the grin to fully capture her lips as she turned to stare into the storm clouds roiling within his eyes. “Everything, Malfoy. I was a bloody open book.”

His only response was a growl low in his throat that stole the smile away as quickly as it had appeared. That part of the plan might have worked, but having a Death Eater as an accomplice was something else entirely. Hermione glared a hole through Malfoy’s head the entire way down the stairs.


	2. Two

~*~ Two ~*~

The door slammed shut behind Malfoy with a deafening thud. He’d been eerily quiet since their exchange at the top of the tower and Hermione’s blood pressure was climbing with every passing second. Malfoy stalked across the room, opening cabinets and drawers, their contents strewn across the room in his wake.

“There are far more important questions you ought to be asking.” Stormy eyes flashed with barely contained ire. “Possibly starting with why you aren’t dead yet.”

“Fine,” she huffed, moving to stand between him and his latest pillaging target. “Why hasn’t Voldemort’s finest disposed of me with due haste?’

Biting silver flashed at her before he returned to opening drawers, moving around her as if she were another piece of the furniture. “Last I checked you had more than half a brain, Granger. You tell me.”

An irritated growl tore from her throat. Three years and he was still as insufferable as she remembered, still the sot who’d managed to get under her skin with even the briefest of sneers.

“Then why the bloody hell did you tell me to ask the question?”

Malfoy paused, expression hovering between impatience and something darker. “It is important you figure out the answer.”

Her teeth ground, but he was already back to tearing at the drapes by the oversized window. Fine. He wasn’t wrong. There was no way Hermione could complete her mission with Malfoy lurking in the background, his intentions unknown and allegiance clearly at odds with her own. So why wasn’t she dead? He’d had a chance to kill her at the top of the Astronomy Tower in their own time, but he hadn’t taken it. Instead he’d hitched a ride across time with her, taking care not to upset the balance when they’d arrived. He’d known who Dumbledore was and even that Hermione had betrayed his master to the current Transfiguration Professor, but still she was breathing. It made no sense. Voldemort had been on the cusp of absolute victory and Hermione was now the only thing that could stop that chain of events. So any loyal Death Eater would have killed her on the spot.

Her breath hitched, drawing Malfoy’s attention. Silver ensnared her as a feral smirk inched across his lips. “So she’s got it.”

“You don’t want Voldemort to win.”

A broad shoulder raised in a half-shrug. “I can neither confirm nor deny that. And don’t get your hopes up. I am definitely not in favor of you changing the past. Too many things could go wrong and while our future is vile, I’m sure there are far worse possibilities.”

Hermione searched his stony features, but there was nothing beyond sharp angles and unfathomable quicksilver. “So why play along?”

“Do I have another option?” Malfoy dropped onto one of the ornate chairs, serpents’ heads where the feet ought to have been. “Now that you’ve given the present Dumbledore access to our entire history, I fear I’m liable to end up in Azkaban if I put one toe out of line. The old coot seemed entirely too eager to let you bring your nefarious plans to fruition. I don’t even exist here to begin with so eliminating me would be… trivial. Thus you see, Granger, I find my odds of survival are best if I stick with you.”

She crossed her arms and sat back against the oaken desk below the window. “You’re not concerned I’ll eliminate you? You are a serious liability to my plans.”

He quirked a pale brow, the storm within his eyes calm, if only for a moment. “I’m not letting down my guard, if that’s what you’re asking. I am, however, fairly certain that Hermione Granger does not kill in cold blood.”

Her wand twirled between her fingers as she let out a bitter laugh. “Three years of war does a lot to change a person. The girl you knew at Hogwarts is long dead and I make no promises I will protect you, not from Riddle and not from Dumbledore.”

Ice cracked over the winter skies within his gaze. “I’m not afraid, Granger. I can hold my own.”

The man from the tower, with her wand grasped dangerously between his fingers was back, reminding Hermione not to underestimate him. He might look like the cowardly boy she remembered, but she knew the darkness underneath her own skin, the chilling echoes of the ability to do what was necessary, regardless of cost. If she’d fallen so far fighting for the light, how mangled must he be, an unparalleled agent of darkness and destruction? Her breath was suddenly too heavy in her chest, the air itself suffocating. Hermione broke away from those quicksilver pools that tangled her in a mire of willfully forgotten truths.

When she could breath again, forget just enough to remember how to pretend, she turned back to Malfoy. He was still sitting in the chair, left hand absently rubbing his leg from thigh to knee, as if stroking a cat.

“We need names.”

“Dacian Mallet. I’ve used it undercover before.”

Hermione nodded. It was sufficiently French and innocuous enough. “A pureblood name?”

“Of course. French Wizarding aristocracy for at least a thousand years. I wouldn’t dream of being descended from anything less.” Silver eyes narrowed to slits. “And come to think of it, neither should you. With Grindelwald on the rise on the continent, this is not the time to cling to your… heritage.”

Her gaze dropped to the mess beneath her jumper sleeve before she could stop it. They’d managed to destroy Bellatrix’s writing, but the scar was a horrific mangle of flesh now. “I’m aware. I was planning on being Hermione Gable. They’re not a prominent pureblood family, but their line does go back a few hundred years.”

“So perhaps we met one summer at a resort in the South of France while your parents were on vacation. We’ve kept up a correspondence since then, but only ever as friends.” Malfoy visibly shuddered as he concluded.

“Is the thought of me truly that repugnant?” Hermione snapped before she could think better of it.

He glared balefully up at her. “Oh, most definitely.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading. I was honestly surprised by the amount of positive feedback on the first chapter. So thanks. The first few chapters are on the shorter side, but after that the length will generally increase for the duration of the story.


	3. Three

~*~ Three ~*~

Hermione could hardly concentrate on the buzz of the students in the Great Hall around her. Despite the dire situation and the fact that the entire student body was assembling. No, instead of studying potential classmates and evaluating possible allies, all of her effort was being sucked into not looking at the man who sat beside her at the small table adjacent to the staff seating.

After their uneasy truce over their cover story, they’d set to dying Malfoy’s hair a less recognizable color. With the help of several herbs and the heating powers of Hermione’s wand, Malfoy was utterly transformed. It had been too dangerous to use a glamour; they both knew exactly how perceptive Tom Riddle could be, so dye had been the only option. Working with what they could find in the greenhouse while Dumbledore enticed the current Herbology Professor away, the only option had been dark, midnight dark. And it made for an extreme change.

Hermione snuck a glance at Malfoy out of the corner of her eye, pulse hammering. Where before he had been pale perfection, untouchable marble, now he was darkly striking, ebony brows and midnight strands emphasizing the contours of his face in ways that remade him. She’d always known Malfoy was objectively handsome, had heard Lavender Brown prattle on about how stunning he’d looked in his dress robes at the Yule Ball for years afterward, but his acidic tongue and sneers had kept her from looking twice. Then the stories had started circulating during the war and she’d hardly been able to think of him as human. But now the blonde boy of her memory was erased and only the enticing angles and planes of his symmetric face were left. Quicksilver eyes that had seemed a storm were now brilliant summer clouds in contrast to his darkness.

She swallowed heavily and looked away before Malfoy caught her staring again. Ever since they’d vanished the remnants of the herbs away, her eyes had been drawn to him, to that face that suddenly seemed so full of possibility, that made her heartbeat do impossible things. She knew her reaction was purely physical, that there was no way a handful of crushed herbs had changed him in any fundamental way, but she was helpless to halt the flutter of her pulse. The stark contrast with her memories made clear that this was a man she barely knew, a man who’d lived through a bloody war, a man who perhaps understood just how ravaged her soul had become. It was a naïve thought, born of a need for physical connection she could not understand, a need that had settled deep in the pit of her stomach after Ron passed and never faded. Her nights with Harry had satisfied the craving, eased the ache enough for her to breath, to fight again another day, but now it burned hotly, begging her to consider the unthinkable.

Clearing her throat, she forced herself to survey the gathering students. The house tables were nearly full, the first years just visible beyond the entrance to the great hall. Hermione had avoided looking at the Slytherin table until now, but she knew that wouldn’t last. As much as she’d like to find some way to strike Riddle down without ever looking him in the face, she knew that was a child’s dream, the hope of the girl who still shied away from the green light at the end of her wand. The girl who thought everything fit in black and white boxes, who believed the world was good and worth saving.

Sighing, Hermione allowed her eyes to trail across the occupants of the Serpent’s Den. The platinum head of hair must belong to the Malfoy relative Dumbledore had alluded to, but beyond that Hermione could identify none of the students at the table. None save the boy at the head, his back toward her, as the boys around him hung on every word he spoke.

Her teeth worried her lip, digging in as Riddle suddenly swung to face the front of the hall. Her breath rushed out of her in a startled gasp. A jolt of electricity raced the length of her spine as cobalt eyes, dark as first night caught hers. Whatever misplaced desire Malfoy’s transformation had evoked was instantly eclipsed as Tom Riddle devoured her every feature with a hungry stare that promised dark oblivion. If Malfoy now appeared a fallen angel of darkness, Riddle was the lord of night himself. Soft waves of obsidian hair fell just above those intoxicating eyes, framing a strong jaw and high cheekbones, less jagged than Malfoy, more sculpted.

She’d heard he was handsome, charming even. She’d never believed it. How could the monster with silted nostrils and no lips ever have held even the smallest modicum of beauty? She’d been wrong, catastrophically wrong. No one had ever looked at her the way he did now, a dark promise of possession and ecstasy. Nor had she ever felt the roiling of her blood reach a fever pitch as it answered his call. Ron had been sweet and then he’d died and the war had made her hard. Sex with Harry had been cathartic, an answer to the ache in her stomach and the abyss growing in her soul, but never once had she felt like this, like he would consume her, if only she’d let him.

“Get a grip,” Malfoy hissed under his breath and she was instantly aware of the flush sweeping across her body, her breath coming in near pants as Riddle continued to stare.

It took nearly all of her self-control to wrench her eyes away from hypnotic cobalt. Malfoy scowled at her as she fought to regain her equilibrium. Looking at him wasn’t much better, but at least he wasn’t Riddle. “Godric.”

Malfoy leaned into her until all she could sense was the bitter smell of herbs in his hair and the hot puff of his breath against her ear. “You look like a bitch in heat, Granger. Pull it together. Now.”

His harsh tone helped focus her, pull her out of Riddle’s enthralling grasp. Hermione twisted her hands together under the table, nails digging into the tender flesh of her palms. She shook her head, forcing the heat down with the reminder that Riddle was the reason she’d traveled here, risking everything. Because he was a monster and she was going to end him. It didn’t matter if he made her feel like a live wire, like she’d just taken her first true breath, because it was her task, her only remaining task in life, to kill him.

“Sorry,” she murmured to Malfoy.

Malfoy’s lips remained ghosting over her skin. “Make sure it doesn’t happen again. Our situation is tenuous enough without you deciding to shag Riddle.”

Hermione nodded, pulling away from Malfoy. He retreated to his half of the table, letting bored eyes inspect the crowd. “Have you given any thought as to what Riddle’s going to do when you get sorted into Gryffindor? From what I’ve heard he hates Dumbledore and anyone else in that ghastly house. Not that I can blame him. Red and gold make a distressing combination.”

“I’m not getting sorted into Gryffindor.”

Malfoy didn’t bother to hide the scoff that followed her pronouncement. “And why, pray tell, is that?”

Hermione rolled her eyes. “It doesn’t serve my purpose here. The sorting hat does let one make a choice. Last time for me it was between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. Even Harry got to choose between Slytherin and Gryffindor. I’ll just choose Ravenclaw this time.”

Stormy eyes blinked once, like an owl. “Did I just hear you right? Potter was nearly in Slytherin?”

“He might actually have chosen it if you hadn’t been such a prick,” Hermione confirmed.

Malfoy stared at her a long moment, as if the idea of Harry Potter in Slytherin had short circuited his brain. “The sorting hat never asked for my opinion.”

“That’s because you were a short-sighted snot. Although I suppose it would have been funny to watch your face if it had suggested Hufflepuff.” To her surprise a wry grin to match her own ghosted across Malfoy’s lips, making his sharp angles soften. She looked away. Allowing her inescapable, twisted need to drive her into Harry’s arms had been one thing, but neither Malfoy or Riddle was a viable option. They were the enemy and no matter how much she craved connection, that would not change.

Taking a steadying breath, she was reminded off all the things she’d yet to process. The pitch of Harry’s body off the ramparts, the knowledge that Voldemort had won, definitely and completely. That her only ally in trying to save a world that didn’t deserve saving was a Death Eater she couldn’t trust. It was no wonder her control had cracked and only her baser needs remained. It was bad enough to be in the past where every move could save or destroy the future she desperately wanted. But now she was playing a game she hadn’t bargained for, a game where the fissures in her soul were gaining control and Tom Riddle’s eyes held infinity in their depths.

Headmaster Dippet cleared his throat, pulling her from the dismal reverie. “Before we begin the sorting process for our first-year students, I would like to welcome two special guests to sit beneath the hat. They join us from the war-ravaged continent to finish their schooling in an environment safe from the Muggle war and from the threat of Grindelwald. Please welcome Miss Hermione Gable and Mister Dacian Mallet.”

There was tepid applause from the students at the house tables as whispers ricocheted across the hall. Clearly the student body hadn’t been expecting additional members. Dumbledore had indicated the prefects and Head Boy and Girl had been briefed along with Dippet, but the word clearly hadn’t gotten out. Hermione shifted in her seat, just curbing the urge to look at Malfoy. With the entire hall staring at her it really wouldn’t do to look for comfort from her unwilling companion. So instead she looked at Tom Riddle, which was infinitely worse.

His full lips were curved in a knowing smile, a smile that made unmentionable acts flutter behind her lashes, those lips put to more productive uses. Her mouth was bone dry by the time she realized Dippet was calling her name. Malfoy scowled at her as she abruptly rose.

“Never again my arse,” he snarked as she brushed past him on her way to the platform with the sorting hat.

She couldn’t fault him for the outburst. Not five minutes ago she’d been promising to keep her urges in check when it came to the magnetic hold Riddle seemed to exert over her. And here she was, drooling like some teenage girl again. With exasperation she plopped onto the stool, which wasn’t nearly as high as she remembered it. Then again, she was a full grown woman of twenty years now, a far cry from the twelve year old she’d been the last time she sat on this stool a half century later.

Dippet placed the hat on her head with a wan smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. The old hat settled into place, rustling quietly.

 _I know you._ She could hear the humor in the voice echoing through her mind. _Although, I don’t know this you very well at all. It seems a fair amount has happened, or is yet to happen, since we last met. But never mind that, we’ve a house to find for you. Your thoughts?_

 _Not Gryffindor._ That was all she knew. With Riddle’s attitude toward Gryffindor, she’d be screwed from the beginning. And she’d already clearly caught his attention. He’d be too interested if the new girl he seemed to have a passing interest in suddenly ended up in the only house he despised.

_Well, definitely not Hufflepuff either, dear. You simply don’t have the right disposition. So Ravenclaw or Slytherin? You’re a smart girl, Miss Granger, but I’m afraid you’ve crossed too many lines at this point. Your strength is your ambition, not your knowledge._

Hermione’s blood ran cold. Whatever heat had been left in the wake of her inappropriate desire was stamped out by the icy tendrils of terror now piercing her every nerve. No. The sorting hat could not possibly be considering placing her in Slytherin. _Anything but that._

 _My decision is final, my dear. You fit in no other house, not anymore._ The hat was silent a long moment, as if giving her a chance to prepare herself for its pronouncement. Then it bellowed for all to hear, “Slytherin!”

Hermione’s eyes met Malfoy’s as she attempted to retrieve her jaw from the floor. This could not possibly be happening. Her knees knocked as she hobbled away from the stool, barely able to cross the distance back to their table. The tempests within his stormy eyes looked like she felt as she collapsed back into her chair. She barely noticed when he rose to take his seat on the stool or when the hat announced another member of Slytherin. All she could hear was the roar of the blood in her temples and the sudden and complete knowledge that she was in over her head, that the rug had been pulled out from under her feet and now there was nothing left to do but fall.


	4. Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the continued support. I hope you are all staying safe. 
> 
> For those of you that might wonder about Hermione's appetites and her interest in Tom, I ask you to have faith. This is a journey and we are only just beginning.
> 
> Chapters 4 and 5 are super short so I'm posting one today and another on Saturday. Then I think I'll transition to posting Tues, Thurs and Sat since that jives better with my work schedule.

~*~ Four ~*~

It took most of dinner, which thankfully had been served to them at the table adjacent to the professors’, and the entire walk down to the dungeons before Hermione was able to wrap her head around exactly how screwed she was. It had been one thing to think of taking down Riddle from the Ravenclaw common room, it was an entirely different thing from within the snake pit itself. Everyone would be gunning for her; every single pureblood would take her to pieces if they found out even one hair on her head was a lie.

She risked a glance at Malfoy, who walked silently beside her, eyes sweeping the corridor as if on patrol. She couldn’t fault him; her own eyes traced the same paths, searching for an ambush that wasn’t coming, at least not now.

The door to the Slytherin common room swung open with a whispered _Mudblood_ that had her skin prickling even if she wasn’t surprised. It would be such a joy to use the slur every day to return to her bed. None of the other Slytherins batted an eye and Hermione reminded herself that it was a different time, a different world and if she was going to take down Tom Marvolo Riddle, certain things like Mudblood would have to roll off her skin like dew from a petal.

“Welcome to Slytherin,” a prefect girl, perhaps a sixth year, beamed at Hermione and Malfoy as they crossed the threshold. “I’m Aurelia Greengrass and I’m one the of prefects. Headmaster Dippet thought it best if I was assigned to help the both of you specifically since you’ll need a much different orientation than the first years. You’ll both be part of sixth year classes, and some seventh year.”

Warm honey eyes blinked up at Hermione from beneath luminous toffee bangs. Despite clearly being a Slytherin, Aurelia didn’t appear to have a single menacing bone in her petite body. Hermione had to blink several times to make sure the girl, and her bubbly personality, were real.

“Uh… thanks,” Hermione managed as the Slytherin kept smiling at her with undeniable enthusiasm.

Malfoy was staring at Aurelia like he’d simultaneously seen a ghost and gotten food poisoning. Hermione elbowed him sharply in the ribs and he reverted to simply appearing nauseous. The girl frowned at him, but turned the full force of her attention onto Hermione.

“We’re sharing a dorm, so I can show you where you’ll bunk when we go upstairs. Your class schedules are already on your beds.” Movement from beyond the fireplace had Aurelia pausing, her cheeks flushing. “But enough about that. I think Tom is excited to meet the both of you. He may not be Head Boy yet, but he’s the head of Slytherin house already, even if he is only a sixth year.”

Electricity shot down her spine as Riddle crooked a finger, summoning them to his fireside milieu. Malfoy shot her a warning glare as they followed the unspoken command. Hermione glared back with equal fervor. She wasn’t stupid. It didn’t matter how strong her craving became, she wasn’t about to risk the very basis of this mission to scratch an itch she knew would not be so easily satisfied.

Infinite cobalt drank her in as they approached, never leaving her eyes and yet sending tremors across every millimeter of her skin. “It is my utter pleasure to meet both of you, Miss Hermione Gable,” Riddle purred, voice deeper than she’d imagined.

His lips, sinfully soft, were against the back of her hand before she could blink, let alone realize he was touching her. If his gaze was pure electricity, his touch was unbridled fire, utterly consuming and infinitely dangerous. She knew he could feel the tremble of her palm, utterly limp in his firm grasp as he stared down at her with a hunger that promised to undo her.

Malfoy cleared his throat and the moment fractured, leaving only her arm shaking against her borrowed skirt, Riddle’s attention momentarily diverted. Malfoy stuck out his hand, “Dacian Mallet.”

“Tom Riddle.”

Their handshake was quick, but firm, Malfoy showing no sign of unease as he smiled grimly across at Riddle. The two were approximately the same height, which surprised her. She’d always thought of Malfoy as slight, smaller, but the last time she’d seen him next to her friends he’d been merely sixteen. She’d known Riddle was tall, but seeing that this young version truly had nothing in common with the snake who’d taken everything threw her. This was a handsome young man; not a monster. And yet she knew, knew that underneath the charm and the beauty lurked the beginnings of one. And it was her job to snuff it out.


	5. Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is more like half a chapter. Anyway, that's just how things flowed. After this all chapters will be full size again. I view this as the last of the "prequel" type chapters. Thank you all for reading. Stay safe.

~*~ Five ~*~

“So what did you think?”

Hermione frowned at Aurelia over her shoulder. “Think?”

A coy smile skated across the girl’s face as she resumed the perusal of her History of Magic text. “About Tom Riddle of course. You’d have to be blind not to see the way he looked at you.”

Hermione absolutely refused to acknowledge the sparks that ignited at the base of her spine. Her hand dug into the pillow on her bed, the alarmingly green sham twisting in her grip. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t be daft,” Aurelia’s voice was suddenly sharp, even if her honey eyes remained warm. “This is Slytherin, Hermione, we can all see right through you. You like the way he looks at you and every single member of this house knows that.”

Hermione’s jaw worked silently for a long moment. Was Aurelia right? Was she truly an open book in this lair of snakes? That would make things all the more precarious, a risk she could ill afford with a multitude of secrets already amassed. Perhaps she had been lulled into complacency by the utter-blockheadedness of the Gryffindor cohort. Harry and Ron had been oblivious to nearly everything important that had ever happened in her life. At least until the war. After that there had been nothing but death and survival left to care about.

“I bet he’s like that with all the girls,” she hedged, not quite willing to acknowledge the chilling truth behind Aurelia’s words.

The petite girl’s lips pursed for a long moment before she sighed. “Actually, no. The girls may be trying to break down his door every night, but Tom has never, and I mean never, given anyone the time of day. He’s showed more interest in you in the last two hours than he’s showed in anyone in his entire time at Hogwarts.”

Hermione’s blood lodged in her veins, frozen solid. “What?”

“Riddle likes you. And that may be the event of the year in Slytherin. I’m pretty sure he’s painted a target on your back, at least as far as the female half of the house is concerned.” Aurelia paused, hazel eyes pleading. “You need to be careful, Hermione. Riddle is… powerful.”

She met the girl’s desperate stare with narrowed eyes. “What are you saying?”

“If Riddle wants you…” Aurelia’s hands wrung together even as her eyes hardened. “You may not be able to say no.”

Hermione’s breath caught. She’d known he’d was feared in his Hogwarts years, Slughorn had been intimidated enough to give him information on bloody Horcruxes. But she’d never truly thought about it, never realized his power would extend beyond the clearly nefarious to the mundane. It was a very good thing that he’d never shown sustained interested in a girl before. Hermione could only imagine how much damage he would have wreaked upon some unsuspecting soul, Slytherin or no. But Hermione wasn’t just any girl; she was a war veteran and four years his senior. She might have an unholy attraction to him, but she knew every one of his secrets. He would never control her.

“I can hold my own,” Hermione murmured, putting the stack of borrowed textbooks in order on her desk.

Aurelia stared at her a long moment, before nodding, honey eyes bright. “Of that, I have no doubt, Hermione Gable.”


	6. Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all again for the continued support. Chapters are more substantial from here on out. Please stay healthy and safe.

~*~ Six ~*~

The next month dragged by in fits of boredom, interrupted occasionally by Malfoy’s caustic stares and Riddle’s attempts to corner her in some remote location of the castle. Thankfully, at least when it came to Riddle, Malfoy was glued to her like second skin. They sat together in every class and outside class he wouldn’t take a step away from her unless Aurelia was present. He seemed to have appointed the Slytherin girl her secondary babysitter. Hermione didn’t need Aurelia or Malfoy, but she was thankful that Malfoy seemed to trust the other girl for reasons known only to him. Hermione would likely have murdered Malfoy within the first week if Aurelia hadn’t been around to give her a respite from his incessant and impossible company.

Half the school thought they were dating, the other half thought they were related. Most of the Slytherins, clearly noticing Malfoy’s dark brooding and overtly possessive behavior, had left her mercifully alone. In truth, Hermione and Malfoy didn’t talk. They hardly even looked at each other and they sure as hell didn’t trust each other. Nothing had changed since that first day when she’d figured out he didn’t want to kill her, but had no interest in helping her either. So they ignored each other as they sat together in classes, as they walked the halls a step apart, as they worked on assignments in the common room, thighs touching as they perched on the couch, utterly inseparable and yet a world apart.

The tingle at the base of her spine every time she saw his dark fringe drop across stormy eyes hadn’t abated, but she’d become adept at burying the feeling. Her breath might still catch and her skin burn at even the slightest touch of his alabaster skin, but he was still cold marble, an ice prince in every way that mattered.

It still took an inordinate amount of energy to fight the growing ache in the pit of her stomach, the urge to find connection with another, to share heat and flesh and breath. Clearly three years of war followed by a time jump halfway across a century had left her nerve endings overly sensitive and the imperfections of her psyche exposed. How else could she justify her continued reactions to Riddle, with whom she’d managed to avoid any contact beyond the occasional pleasantry? Malfoy she could excuse, she knew he didn’t pose an immediate threat, but Riddle? He was absolutely a danger to her, to the whole damn world, and yet every time she locked eyes with him she was lost to those infinite cobalt depths, mission forgotten, every memory of blood and infinite pain negated in a mere moment. It was a feeling she could not abide; it put all she hoped to gain at risk and left her yearning for a peace that was utterly unattainable. Thus, she avoided him at all costs, allowing Malfoy to become her constant shadow despite him being oil to her water. Better to throw her lot in with the devil she knew than throw the world away for a taste of the impossible.

“You’re staring at the bloody bastard again.”

Hermione tore her eyes away from Riddle, cheeks suddenly hot. “I was not.”

Malfoy’s knife cut the flobber worm with more zeal than necessary. “I’m not having this argument with you again. I just have no idea how you expect to accomplish your goals while you’re pining after your target like a sick kneazle.”

“What do you care if I succeed?”

The knife flashed in the dim light of the Potions classroom. “I don’t.”

“Are you going to use that on me?”

A dark smirk settled on his full lips. “I am sorely tempted. But you are still my only way out of this mess, Gable, so no. You can sleep safe another night.”

“Oh, joy.” She unceremoniously dumped the diced flobber worm into their potion. The surface of the potion changed from roiling green to milky white. “Is it supposed to do that?”

Malfoy pursed his lips, a broad shoulder rising in half a shrug. “You were always the Exceeds Expectations student, not me.”

Hermione’s eyes shot to meet his wintery stare. “I seem to recall that you were close on my heels, at least until sixth year.”

“A madman in the parlor has a way of messing up your study schedule,” he deadpanned, eyes rimed with ice.

Hermione’s lips parted to respond, but snapped shut again as Slughorn moved to stand before their table. A wide smile engulfed his lips as he stared down at the milky white potion. He turned to face the rest of the class as he hollered, “Gather round, gather round!”

Hermione caught Malfoy’s uneasy look as the rest of the sixth year potions class, including Riddle, crowded around their potion. She stepped back, her shoulder brushing gently against his as they anxiously watched Slughorn gesticulate wildly.

“Now here we have a perfect Elixir of Winter. Ms. Gable and Mr. Mallet have worked in harmony to create the finest one of these I’ve seen in decades… you don’t get a potion like this without a strong foundation of trust between the brewers…”

Slughorn continued on, but Hermione’s brain had short-circuited. Trust? The potion was a sign that she and Malfoy shared trust? That was absurd. There was nothing between them except an understanding, a very precarious understanding that merely served to keep them both alive in this hostile environment, nothing more. She could feel Malfoy go absolutely rigid against her side, and she didn’t dare look at him. Instead she watched as the students dissipated, Slughorn clearly done with his spiel, until only Riddle remained. Weighty cobalt eyes swung between Hermione and her partner for a long moment.

“Dacian, would you mind if I borrowed your… friend for a moment?” The question was innocent enough, but the hard edge beneath Riddle’s words was undeniable.

Hermione’s finally looked into the tempests of Malfoy’s eyes, but he didn’t look back, gaze locked on Riddle instead. The harsh edge of his jaw sharpened as he stared across at the younger boy. “Anything you have to say to Miss Gable, you can say in front of me.”

Riddle took a step closer to Malfoy, edging around the side of the table until the two were nearly toe to toe. “It’ll only be a second, Mallet. You can stand to be without your bloody girlfriend for at least a minute, can’t you?”

“We’re not—”

“Dating.” Malfoy cut into her protest, spitting the word.

Riddle blinked, a dark and dangerous light igniting behind his eyes. “In that case, I can think of no reason why you’re still standing here, Mallet.”

Hermione was caught in a winter blizzard as Malfoy’s gaze met hers. They had run out of excuses. She could see just how much he hated to walk away at this moment, but there was nothing left to say that Riddle would believe. They’d managed to avoid this conversation for a month, but their time had run out. Sighing, Hermione gave Malfoy the smallest of nods. He was gone a moment later.

“There’s more to you than meets the eye, Miss Gable.” Riddle commented, dark eyes trailing Malfoy’s departure.

Hermione swallowed, doing her best to avoid eye contact and all the unwanted feelings Riddle evoked. “What makes you say that?”

“You and Dacian make a perfect potion despite not having had proper schooling for some time. That speaks to a significant amount of training, despite the war.”

Hermione stared at the wall behind Riddle’s shoulder, unsure of what he was implying. “I don’t think I follow.”

“I apologize. Perhaps I should be more forthright. Based on your skill, and Dacian’s, I am forced to draw the conclusion that you fought in the war. Would I be correct?”

His tone was genial, but Hermione knew better. Riddle had already put the pieces together. Fighting in the war had never been part of their cover story; it seemed far too implausible for two students to be so battled hardened, but Hermione could understand how someone with keen observational skills, which Riddle clearly possessed, could discern the truth. She and Malfoy were both overly cautious, always scanning their surroundings, they were more skilled in defense spells than their peers, their potions were almost always perfect. It didn’t take a genius to figure out they’d seen time on the front lines of battle.

So she couldn’t lie to Riddle, couldn’t brush aside his assertion like a piece of lint. “Yes. We fought.”

“And you killed.”

His words were punch to her gut and she couldn’t help the swing of her eyes to meet his. There was a hunger within his dark stare that scared her, that spoke of more than mere desire. Hermione swallowed around the lump in her throat. “War is messy, Mr. Riddle.”

The hunger was abruptly snuffed and he looked honestly repentant when he said, “Forgive me, my curiosity seems to have gotten the better of me. I apologize. That was an indelicate thing to ask.” His heavy stare swung to focus on Malfoy where he sulked against the doorframe, waiting for Hermione. “Dacian doesn’t seem to like me much.”

Hermione couldn’t help the snort that escaped at his observation. “He doesn’t like anyone. Don’t take it personally.”

Of course, Riddle should absolutely take it personally, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. It was bad enough he’d discovered how active they’d been in the war. He absolutely did not need to pry any further details out of either Hermione or Malfoy.

Riddle was staring at her again; she could tell by the way her skin was prickling, as if lightning were crackling just beneath the surface. Steeling herself against the effect, she shifted her focus back to his face. A different type of darkness had crept into his eyes, a darkness that promised to ease the ache in her stomach and mend the fissures of her soul.

Riddle’s voice was rough, utterly untamed, as he leaned down, full lips just brushing her ear as he murmured, “You may be broken, Miss Gable, but it’s in the most beautiful way imaginable.”

Then he was gone, brushing past Malfoy and out the door before Hermione could remember how to breathe again.


	7. Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Continued thank you for all of your support. Thank you for giving this a try. Be healthy, be safe.

~*~ Seven ~*~

Malfoy’s grip on her shoulder was rough as he pulled her away from the Slytherin table after supper the next evening. The storm clouds gathering behind his eyes had been suffocating her ever since the confrontation with Riddle in potions. Thankfully Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts were the only classes they shared with the Slytherin Prince, but it was clear Riddle had gotten under Malfoy’s skin just as surely as he’d crawled under hers. There hadn’t been a spare moment to share just how disastrous the conversation had been, but Hermione suspected Malfoy already knew. He’d been even more present than usual, not leaving her side until she set foot on the girls’ staircase. It would have been almost sweet if he hadn’t looked intent on murdering her himself.

Hermione tore herself from his punishing grip, but kept up with his fevered pace as they swept up the staircase. She knew better than to ask him anything; the walls had honest to Merlin ears in this castle and they were already on thin ice. Her breath only caught for a second when they stopped, the doors of the Room of Requirement looming before them. She tamped down on what little ire she still harbored for Malfoy’s ill-fated mission sixth year. It was ancient history, from another lifetime entirely.

She waited as Malfoy paced, dark brows drawn in concentration, then his hand was burning against her skin as he hauled her into the room. The doors clanged shut and he abruptly released her arm, leaving her cold and bereft.

“You’re learning Occlumency tonight.”

Hermione blinked at him. “What?”

Malfoy pushed the dark fringe back from his pale forehead as he collapsed into an armchair beside the fireplace. “You bloody heard me, Granger.”

She took her time moving across the room to sit in the chair adjacent to his. The fire was warm against the chill of the castle, a warmth she hadn’t realized she craved. “I already know Occlumency.”

Malfoy’s eyes flew toward the ceiling. “I sincerely hope you don’t actually believe that. I can get inside your head without even trying. I have to actively try not to read your thoughts. I don’t imagine Riddle will be so accommodating.”

“I’ve managed to avoid him.” It was a pathetic attempt to avoid the truth of his statement.

“Yes, clearly that went so well yesterday. He’s already interested, has been since he laid eyes on you, and you’ve forgotten who he is entirely if you think he’s going to let it go just because you’re playing hard to get. Which you aren’t, by the way. You’re bloody staring at him every time you’re in the same room. It’s nauseating.” Malfoy’s voice was hard and his eyes held icy accusation in their depths.

And he was right. She’d tried to stop looking, to ignore that captivating numbness she felt every time Riddle found her with his hypnotic stare, but she hadn’t stopped. Some twisted part of her soul craved even his briefest look. “I don’t know why he has this effect on me.”

It was a lie. She might not understand why he was so appealing, but the craving was nothing new, a product of loss and death and untold despair. But she would not risk losing Malfoy, her only lifeline to reality, or losing sight of this mission. She still heard the dull thud of Harry’s fall every night before sleep finally claimed her. It echoed like a drum in her ears until all she could do was muffle her sobs beneath the blankets and pray Aurelia didn’t notice. Her war-ravaged soul craved connection, and the mindless pleasure it entailed, but Riddle was not an option, no matter how darkly enticing he’d become.

“It doesn’t matter,” Malfoy dismissed. “What matters is keeping him out of your head. Permanently.”

“Harry already showed—”

“That’s your bloody problem then, Granger. Potter was piss at Occlumency despite Snape having tried his damnedest. Whatever he showed you was equally piss.” He stared evenly at Hermione, not a trace of emotion behind frostbitten irises.

She wanted to be angry with him, to deny his words, but she knew better. She’d seen Harry’s struggle, even into the war years, to keep Voldemort out. But Malfoy, Malfoy had kept his entire plan from Dumbledore sixth year. Likely the old man had known some of what was to come, but Hermione couldn’t help but believe Malfoy had kept most of it from both Snape and Dumbledore, which meant he was a passable Occlumens.

“Fine.”

“We’ll start with you trying _Legilimens_ on me. You won’t be able to get in, but I want you to pay attention to how I keep you out. What it feels like, etcetera.” Malfoy shifted so he was fully facing her, moving to the edge of the ornate velvet armchair.

It felt odd to raise her wand against him, despite their years on opposing sides of the war. She hadn’t forgotten who he was, or just how dangerous he was to her, but their truce had allowed her to relax just the slightest bit, enough that her hand shook as it held her wand between them.

“You can’t hurt me.” His voice was softer, the storm behind his eyes quiet.

Hermione ignored the shiver that traced down her spine. “ _Legilimens_.”

There was a brief moment of confusion then she could feel him around her. Not distinct thoughts or emotions, but the sense that she was within his mind, a part of him, if only for a moment. Narrowing her eyes, she stared purposefully at him, trying to see beyond the physical. But she couldn’t move beyond the general sense of him. It was as if a window stood between them; she could see his consciousness, but her attempt to enter was met with solid resistance. A grunt of frustration tore from her lips as she collapsed back into her chair.

“Not bad, better than I expected actually,” Malfoy admitted, a hint of appreciation coloring his words. “But can you guess how I’m keeping you out?”

“You’re letting me in,” she realized.

A light sparked within his eyes and her breath caught at the sudden evolution of his dark visage. Without the cold façade, he reminded her suddenly of Sirius sitting at the table in Grimmauld Place, equally stormy eyes dancing in merriment at something Harry said. The memory stung, piercing her deeply, leaving her yearning for a time before everything fell apart. She swallowed, forcing air into her lungs. The resemblance was uncanny, but unsurprising considering Malfoy was a Black as well.

“Yes. I am. What else, Granger?” he asked, forcing her back to the present, to the gentle patience etched on his impossible features.

Hermione closed her eyes against the unfamiliar man in front of her. She could hardly concentrate when he was edging her world toward a precipice she’d not known existed. Draco Malfoy could not make her feel this way, like she was safe, like maybe she could trust again. No, they might be united in this, but she could not afford to fool herself into thinking this was anything permanent. Not so long ago those tempestuous eyes had been covered by the cruel silver of a Death Eater mask. He was still a cold-blooded killer and master of pain, as dangerous, if not more so, than Riddle. No, Malfoy was no boy aspiring to power, he was a man with war in his veins.

She cleared her throat and redirected her focus to the attempt to penetrate his mind. Just because he was still the enemy didn’t mean she wouldn’t learn everything she could from him. “You let me in and then put me somewhere of your choice. You made sure it didn’t feel like you were doing any of that, like you didn’t have control, made it seem like I just wasn’t good enough to get in.” She paused considering the revelation. “Does that mean you have to know the attempt is coming?”

“At first, yes.” Malfoy ran a hand through the midnight tresses that fell enticingly across his alabaster skin. Hermione pretended she didn’t notice. “It takes a while for the reaction to become instinctual. I’ve been using a significant amount of Occlumency since I was sixteen, so by now what I did to you is second nature. It took years and a number of… close calls for me to not think about it.”

Hermione studied him, letting the silence drag out between them. “You’ve used Occlumency against…”

Malfoy didn’t react, but his eyes flashed, daring her to finish the statement. She swallowed, attempting to wrap her head around what he seemed to be telling her. She’d known who he was. He was Draco Malfoy. The boy who’d let the Death Eaters into the school, the boy who’d called her Mudblood for as long as she could remember, the boy who’d become a monster during the war. She’d only fought against him a handful of times, but his reputation as an efficient killer, supreme strategist and architect of torment preceded him. When she’d realized it was him on the Astronomy Tower, when he’d disarmed her in the space of a heartbeat, she’d known it was all true. And yet.

“You’ve used Occlumency against Voldemort.”

“For years.”

Hermione straightened in her seat, the feeling rushing through her perilously like hope. “Why?”

What openness had existed on his sharp features was gone in an instant. “We aren’t friends, Granger, and that is absolutely none of your business.”

She swallowed whatever cutting retort was on the tip of her tongue. If Malfoy was capable of successfully shutting out Voldemort, whatever the reason, who was she to turn down his help? “Fine. Just teach me how.”

“It won’t be pleasant.”

It wasn’t. They spent the next three hours and the subsequent five nights sequestered in the Room of Requirement, Malfoy ripping through her mind as she learned minute by minute how to build a fortress to keep him out. Often the memories he dragged up were the horrors of war or the mundane from before but every so often he’d stumble upon more intimate moments. Her cheeks had flamed the first time he’d seen her and Harry, a memory of their first time, both of them wasted and lonely. But Malfoy hadn’t said a thing and soon she’d become resigned to his all access pass to her bedroom. Hermione honestly had no idea how much of her desperate affair with Harry he’d witnessed, or even the fleeting and innocent romance with Ron before that, but it seemed he wasn’t going to use those memories against her. Or perhaps he was saving it as ammunition for later.

Either way, Hermione was improving. By the end of the week, Malfoy only had access to what she wanted him to see. It was still far more than what she was comfortable having Riddle learn, but the important details like time travel, Voldemort and their true identities would be relatively safe.

“Remember all this is really only going to help you if he doesn’t outright attack you. It’s going to be months before you’re able to prevent a full-on verbal _Legilimens_. But I don’t see Riddle being so obvious about it. He still has a reputation to protect at Hogwarts.” Malfoy admitted, crossed arms pulling his white dress shirt tight as he leaned against the mantlepiece in the Room of Requirement.

“So the fact that Prof. Price has paired me with Riddle for the upcoming DADA demonstration isn’t going to be a complete disaster?” She’d been so horrified by the pairing, assigned at the end of the last class, she’d neglected to inform Malfoy before now.

Malfoy’s frame tensed, transforming from casual nonchalance to hardened warrior in mere seconds. “Get out of it.”

“Don’t you think I’ve tried?” Hermione snapped back, rising from her seat on the divan, the central element of the newest furniture arrangement the room seemed to feel the need modify each time they entered. They’d started out with separate chairs, but after the first night it had only been couches, loveseats and divans.

“Try harder,” Malfoy spat back, meeting her halfway.

Suddenly he was too close, his breath hot on her cheeks as he glared down at her. “Isn’t that the point of all this? To be able to deal with him? To not freak out when I have to get paired up on an assignment?”

“I am very sure the point of this,” he motioned angrily between them, words spit between grinding teeth, “is to murder the bloody bastard.”

Hermione recoiled, stumbling back a step. Her heartbeat was a rapid staccato in her temples as Malfoy’s words echoed in her ears. How could she have forgotten? Why was she worrying about pairing up with Riddle for an assignment when she should be coming up with a plan to eliminate him, to save the world from the monster he would become. _That he would become._ Riddle hadn’t even killed his father yet. Beyond opening the Chamber of Secrets he hadn’t done anything but be a lonely boy looking for power in a world that saw his parentage as the scum beneath their boots.

“What if I can save him?”

The room was deathly silent, even the fire ceasing to crackle beside them. Malfoy’s mouth was open, jaw slack as thunderheads built behind his eyes. He blinked and lightning crackled.

“You cannot possibly be serious. It was insane to come back here to kill him, but to what? Seduce him? That’s beyond all reason.”

Against all reason, Hermione dug in. “What do you even care? You already said you don’t believe in changing the past. What does it matter if I kill him or kiss him?”

“Seducing the Dark Lord isn’t going to make a bloody difference, Granger.” Malfoy tore his hands through his hair, giving it a disheveled look she’d never seen on him before. “Play that out, all you’re going to get is a possessive monster in love with you. And that’s at best, the version where he doesn’t figure out every last secret you have and he’s still capable of human emotion. You can’t even imagine the worst.”

Malfoy took a step toward her, but stumbled mid-step, his full mouth twisting. Still glaring at her, he collapsed on the divan.

“Are you…?” Hermione wasn’t even sure what she was asking.

His glare grew even more fierce. “Don’t bloody mind me, Granger. We’re talking about your insanity right now. You’re right, I don’t want to mess anything up any further than it already is, but it seems clear you’re hell bent on changing the future for better or worse. Okay, fine. But not by trying to save the bloody Dark Lord, you stupid girl.”

“I don’t get you!” Hermione exploded, suddenly unable to tame her frustration. “One minute you’re threatening me, the next you’re helping me. What do you even want? Whose side are you on, Malfoy?”

“My own bloody side,” he hissed, dark brows drawn.

His response had her momentarily thrown. She’d expected… well, she wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it wasn’t that. “So you’re not a Death Eater?”

The fight was suddenly gone as he stared up at her, left hand rubbing his thigh. “I’ve been a Death Eater since I was sixteen, Granger. That doesn’t mean it was ever my choice.”

“Oh.” It was all she could think to say.

“You don’t know a bloody thing about me, Granger, so don’t pretend you do.”

“Okay.” It felt like something monumental had passed between them, but Hermione couldn’t identify what had changed. Sighing, she settled onto the divan next to him, eying his haggard features behind the midnight fan of his hair. He was utterly foreign to her like this, nothing like the pale boy who’d tormented her.

“Promise me you won’t get involved with Riddle.” He tipped his head to stare at her, eyes heavy with a need she couldn’t understand.

“I promise.” It was a foolish girl’s wish to save Riddle, the wish of a girl who didn’t have a body count to her name. Hermione knew she had no time for such flights of fantasy.

Malfoy’s eyes slid shut, his shoulders sagging as he murmured, “Thank you, Hermione.”

Hermione nodded, the sound of her name on his lips suddenly the most precious thing. She wasn’t alone here. For now, at least, she could trust this dark man beside her. This man with demons to rival her own. It was something and perhaps that’s all she needed. This wasn’t a happily ever after and Hermione knew better than to imagine one.


	8. Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your support. So, I break a lot of magic rules in this chapter, or at least blur the lines pretty hard. It's a creative choice; I know I'm breaking rules. What is fanfiction though, if not sandbox to build one's own castles in?

~*~ Eight ~*~

Hermione had practiced every night for the past three weeks and finally she’d noticed the slight pressure at her temples every time Riddle managed to capture her full attention. It had seemed like nothing until Malfoy pointed out Legilimency felt like the onset of a headache sometimes, especially if you weren’t well trained in Occlumency. Icy tendrils of dread had knotted her stomach upon the realization of Riddle’s attempts to invade her mind. She’d nearly run out of the classroom, but a couple of deep breaths and a glance in Malfoy’s direction had given her the strength to pretend nothing was wrong.

Riddle had tried a handful of other times since she’d recognized the signs, but her skills were improving on a daily basis and she was confident he’d seen nothing beyond petty worries concerning schoolwork. It was easy to project those anxieties at him when they were usually at the forefront of her mind anyway. It turned out three years of war had done nothing to quell her need to excel in the classroom. She’d thought perhaps she wouldn’t care anymore. After all, she knew how little most of the content mattered now, but instead the insufferable know-it-all she’d once been scrambled to the surface as if she’d merely been hibernating while Hermione’s world was torn apart. Sometimes she was so caught up in her classes that she’d turn to Malfoy expecting Harry or Ron. No matter how many times it happened, the pit of her stomach fell out every time, the sudden onslaught of grief nearly unbearable.

“Gable,” Malfoy hissed, his heel connecting solidly with her shin.

“Fuck, that actually hurt, you git.”

“Such a pleasant mouth you have, Gr- Gable.” His mouth twisted sharply at his mistake. Hermione leveled a stare at him, brow raising. Malfoy sighed, hand pushing back his midnight bangs. “Professor Price is having you and Riddle do your demonstration first thing today.”

“Lovely,” she groused. The assignment had thankfully required very little collaboration between her and Riddle, mostly because they were both hopeless overachievers when it came to DADA. In Hermione’s case the practical experience of actually fighting in a war had more than prepared her. In Riddle’s… she wasn’t entirely sure how he was quite so adept, but it had quickly become clear he’d spent most weekends in the Restricted Section digging into the darkest spells he could find. Not that he was going to use any of them during a class presentation. No, both of them would need to be on their best behavior, for which Hermione was thankful. She honestly wasn’t sure if she could take Riddle in a knock-down, drag out fight.

“Remember to act like a seventh year student, Granger,” Malfoy murmured in her ear, suddenly far too close. Hermione bit her lip and drew away from him, looking for Riddle.

Confident cobalt eyes met hers across the classroom, his full lips drawing up in the echo of a smirk. She grabbed her bag and closed the distance between them, mentally arming as she moved. Sinking into the vacant seat beside him, she valiantly ignored the thunder of her pulse.

“Ready for showtime, Miss Gable?” His voice was soft, but rough in all the right ways. Chills danced down her spine, vibrating her with unwelcome need. She ground her teeth and forced the litany of reasons she could not possibly feel this way into her thoughts.

“Might as well get it done.” She was proud of how strong her voice sounded, a world apart from the chaos raging within. Malfoy shifted in his seat across from her and she found refuge in the storm of his eyes. “How about you, Riddle?”

“I told you to call me Tom,” he chastised lightly. “I know you’re capable of more than you’ve let on in class, Miss Gable. When we get out there don’t hold back. I want to see you shine.”

Hermione’s focus ripped away from Malfoy to stare, full deer in the headlights, at Riddle. “What? This is a class…”

“Yes, I’m fully aware. A class that’s bored out of its mind. So let’s give them something to talk about. What better way to prove you’re the best?” Hermione could tell he was merely trying to appeal to her vanity, the problem was it was working. A spark, a facet of the girl she’d once been, had been ignited. She did want to show the world what she could do. It had been years since she’d tried to impress instead of defend and survive. She couldn’t truly go full out, but perhaps she could throw a few more sophisticated spells into the mix.

“Okay,” she agreed, a smile tugging at her lips, the sensation foreign after so many years. Riddle smiled back, a smile that didn’t have a trace of deception or malice behind it, a smile that turned her world upside yet again. Her breath caught, the moment making her heart ache, making her forget everything except the boy smiling back at her.

“Mr. Riddle and Miss Gable are up next,” Professor Price’s shrill voice cut into the moment, but the rush of warmth remained. “These two are the top of your class, so please make sure to take notes.”

Hermione moved silently with Riddle to stand across from each other in the open space at the front of the room. They bowed to each other, then raised wands. She should feel perilous here, facing the future Dark Lord, but instead she felt free. Riddle hadn’t tried to get into her head and for this moment at least, she knew she was safe from him, despite the wand pointing at her chest. They were in this together.

Riddle moved quickly, but not so quickly she couldn’t react. “ _Reducto_.”

He’d put perhaps a tenth of his power behind it and it bounced harmlessly off her _Protego_. “ _Confundo!_ ”

Riddle didn’t bother to block the spell, merely ducked as he began his next volley. “ _Reducto, diffindo, petrificus totalus!_ ”

In Hermione’s original sixth year DADA class that sequence would have had her bleeding and likely petrified. But she’d faced the darkest of curses fired with the intention of death on a weekly basis for three years. She dropped into a roll, not wasting the time on a shield. The _diffindo_ whispered past her ear, the _petrificus_ exploding against the castle wall behind her. She continued the roll, staying in motion, as she fired off a nonverbal _incendio_.

Cobalt eyes morphed into molten sapphire as Riddle’s robes caught fire. She leapt to her feet, avoiding his next two curses, nasty ones she was sure would send her to the infirmary if she was caught in the crossfire. But there was no danger of that. Hermione easily darted through his constant barrage, twisting and turning like a dancer as she edged closer to him. When she was within a few paces of him, she cast a wordless _protego_ followed instantly by an _accio_ with the full force of her magic behind it. The spell, designed less for disarming and more for long distance summoning, was unstoppable this close. Riddle’s wand slammed into her open palm with a smack.

He let out a low growl of frustration and Hermione knew it wasn’t over. His hand was up a moment later, a wandless _diffindo_ arcing her direction. She dropped both the wands, blocking his spell with a wandless _protego_ of her own. His eyes were wide, full of a hunger that called to her, that begged her to unleash the full potential of her arsenal. She was helpless to deny him.

The spells started flying between them at a dizzying rate, the room utterly silent except for the crash of magic against shields and walls. They’d given up the pretense of needing to wave a hand or wand to launch an attack, so now magic simply crackled between them, seemingly conjured from thin air. Sweat matted her hair to her brow, but Riddle fared no better. She could see the trails of perspiration tracing his strong jaw, soaking the vee of his sweater. They could probably go on for some time still, but Hermione had no interest in exhausting herself for no good reason. Satisfaction swimming in her veins, she ducked Riddle’s latest attack before spinning, too fast for him to register her shift in direction, and unleashing one of her special war-time knockout curses on his chest at point blank range.

Riddle flew backward instantly, head smashing with an audible crack against the stone wall. Hermione was jolted back to reality by the dark smear of red left behind on the wall as he slid down, momentarily unconscious. Whatever high she’d been on evaporated in an instant, cold dread permeating her every pore.

“What the bloody hell were you thinking?” Malfoy’s arms were around her, dragging her from the room, his breath hot against her skin, his fingers trembling on her shoulders.

“I’m so sorry, so, so sorry,” she mumbled against his neck, clinging to him as the reality of what she’d done fully coalesced.

Strong arms wrapped around her, pulling her flush against his warmth, against the only safety she had left. “You’ll be okay. We’ll figure this out too.”

“I…” She didn’t even know where to begin. She didn’t know how to explain how Riddle had made her feel, how unfettered she’d been.

Malfoy shook his head, silken midnight strands kissing her skin. “I promise I won’t let anything happen to you.”

A part of her said he was lying, reminded her of just how many lives he’d taken, of the silver mask he’d worn, of the minds he’d left shattered. But she didn’t have the strength to doubt him, not in this moment, not with Riddle having pushed her beyond reason. “He’s going to kill me.”

“He’s not.”

That wasn’t Malfoy’s soft whisper. She whirled in Malfoy’s arms, his hands coming to rest at her waist as Riddle stared down at her. She shuddered and Malfoy pulled her closer, his breath tickling the nape of her neck.

Her mouth didn’t work the first two attempts, but finally she managed to choke out, “I’m sorry.”

Riddle laughed, laughed like they’d just shared an inside joke, not a battle that had left him unconscious on the floor. “No hard feelings, Miss Gable. I told you I didn’t want you to hold back. You more than delivered. You have absolutely nothing to be sorry about.”

Malfoy shifted against her, his heartbeat slowing against her back. “She knocked you into a wall.”

Riddle gave an easy shrug. “And I’ll have a headache until I stop by to see Madam Pomfrey. It was a nice change of pace to have a worthy opponent, Mallet.”

Hermione could hear Malfoy’s teeth grind, but finally she could breathe again. It seemed the Dark Lord wasn’t going to make an appearance today, only Riddle, who seemed oddly happy to have been knocked on his ass. She broke away from Malfoy’s protective grasp, the adrenaline waning in her veins.

“Can we have a moment?” Riddle addressed the question to Hermione, but his gaze quickly focused on Malfoy behind her.

“You can,” she answered, shooting a quelling glare over her shoulder to silence any protests Malfoy might have expressed. But he merely stared down at her, stormy eyes suddenly hard glass. He held her gaze a moment longer as he stepped away from her, the sudden absence of his heat leaving her shivering in the corridor. Then he was gone, midnight hair disappearing back into the DADA classroom down the hall.

“And you say there’s nothing going on between the two of you.” Riddle was watching Malfoy’s retreat with a bemused smile tugging at his lips. Hermione’s focus lingered a moment too long on his mouth as she shifted to face him.

Sighing, she leaned back against the cold stone, desperately ignoring the absence of Malfoy’s warmth. “We have a… history.”

“The war.”

Not quite the war Riddle was thinking of, but the truth nevertheless. “Yes.”

She could feel the full force of Riddle’s attention come to rest on her face, her skin tingling under the intensity of his gaze. “Why in the world did you think I was going to kill you, Miss Gable?”

Telling him he was the future Dark Lord and evil incarnate likely wasn’t the way to handle the situation. “I smashed you into the wall in front of an entire classroom of people. It would be natural and expected for you to want revenge.”

“You’re forgetting the very important part where I asked you to.” Riddle shifted so he was leaning against the wall next to her. There was a humor in his cobalt eyes that surprised her, shifting the foundation upon which she stood. “I might not have known you were going to crack my head open, but I can’t say I’m unhappy with the result.”

Hermione tilted her head to stare up at him, suddenly aware of just how close they were. She could feel the soft caress of his breath on face, his mouth mere millimeters from her skin. A shudder that had nothing to do with the cold ran down her spine. She defiantly focused on the stone between them.

“So you wanted me to try and kill you?” She huffed, praying he didn’t notice the thundering of her pulse against flushed skin.

“Well I hardly think you’d be able to kill me,” he replied, a wicked grin on his lips. “But I was pretty sure you were far more talented than you’d let on. One doesn’t fight in a war and not pick up a few tricks us schoolboys have no hope of ever learning.”

Riddle wasn’t wrong. It hadn’t been until the war, with endless battles and infinite exhaustion, that she’d truly honed her dueling technique. It hadn’t been by choice, but by necessity and it had been unpleasant every moment until she’d gained the control she desperately needed. “I wouldn’t view such skills so lightly, Mr. Riddle. War isn’t glamorous. The skills I have aren’t something to show off, they’re what kept me alive.”

The teasing grin evaporated from Riddle’s lips as she held his stare. For once she wasn’t worried about him pillaging her mind. Let him look, let him see what horrors awaited behind the façade of glory. He wanted power, but power wasn’t simple; it was messy and laden with tolls of the soul. Maybe seeing the truth so early would change his path, maybe it could save them both.

Riddle’s fingers were on her skin, tracing a line of fire along her jaw. “How did you break so beautifully?”

Hermione trembled against his touch, her breath a shallow pant in the silence between them. She squeezed her eyes shut, using every ounce of will power to pull away from him. “We can’t.”

“You won’t,” he corrected, his fingers dropping from her face to capture her wrist. His hand was large, encircling her easily as he pulled her closer. She could smell him, a heady mix of wintergreen and cloves that had her inhaling deeply. “Is it Dacian? He never has to know, no one does.”

The words were murmured in her ear, his lips just brushing her skin. The torment in Malfoy’s eyes when he’d made her promise not to do this burned behind her eyelids, but she still sighed, still relaxed against Riddle, still let his lips travel a path of destruction across her flushed cheek. She was vibrating with need by the time his lips brushed softly against hers, the barest ghost of a kiss.

“Stop denying this, Hermione.” She could feel every movement of his disastrous lips as he spoke. “Whatever you think is between us… it isn’t. Whatever you think I am, I’m not.”

The darkest of souls. That was who he was and even now she knew that hadn’t changed. But this boy hadn’t murdered anyone. Between the two of them, she was the killer. She was utterly broken, battered by war and grief until there was nothing but shreds of her soul. Perhaps this dark boy could help weave them back together. Perhaps she could save him and make all of it, every infinite moment of pain, worth it.

A better world. That’s what she told herself as she finally let the walls of her control shatter with a ragged sigh as she crashed into him. Riddle caught her, strong hands gripping her hips as his tongue and lips rewrote history. She moaned, wanton and lost, into his mouth and he swallowed it. Her hands tangled in his ebony curls, softer than she’d ever imagined. His lips angled until he was plundering the depths of her mouth, leaving no nerve untouched. Her skin was on fire, her heart lost to a frantic tattoo.

She’d been kissed before, but never like this. It had been pleasant with Ron, but more innocent than satisfying. With Harry, it had been about quelling the ache, threads of grief and suffering intermingled with desire. Riddle was devouring her, mind, body and soul. It was more than mere lust; it was an awakening she hadn’t known she was waiting for.

Riddle’s breath was a ragged pant against her skin as he pulled back. Their lips were still brushing, sending tingles rocketing down her spine, but he was no longer consuming every facet of her.

“Fuck… if I knew it would be like that, I’d have kissed you weeks ago.”

Hermione could feel the blush burning her face. Aurelia’s comment about Riddle’s complete lack of dating came to mind as she finally started to find an order to her thoughts. “Am I the first…?”

His laugh was sharp, but his eyes pooled to warm sapphire. “You think I could kiss like that the first time? No. I’ve avoided attachments at Hogwarts but I still go… home during the summers. There are plenty of willing participants beyond these castle walls.”

She blinked, the paradigm shifting yet again. Riddle had spent his summers making out with Muggle girls? Perhaps even sleeping with them. Didn’t he despise his Muggle blood and everything else that entailed? Shaking her head, she murmured, “You’re just full of surprises.”

“I imagine I’m not the only one.” His nose bushed against her flushed cheek as his lips languidly captured hers. Their tongues tangled, slowly building back the fever pitch of desire. His hands were everywhere, teasing the skin of her back, cupping the nape of her neck, trailing the column of her throat, imprinting on her soul. She was lost and for the moment, she didn’t care. She welcomed the oblivion, the opportunity to let the horror fade until it was only his lips and hands, only him against the dark destruction of her soul.

It might have been hours, but likely only minutes passed before he pulled back again. His pale skin was flushed, his ebony waves in utter disarray, his lips swollen and begging her to return to them. She moved to chase the lost pleasure and he laughed, softly now, in sympathy. “As much as I’d like to stand here all day discovering all your secrets, Hermione, class is dismissed in a few minutes. If we want to keep this to ourselves, I don’t think kissing in the hall is the best way to start.”

Right. Malfoy would bloody murder her if he found out what she was doing with Riddle. And not metaphorically. “This has to stay a secret, Riddle. A lot depends on that.”

“I don’t mind,” he assured, lips twisting in a sly smile, “but please would you stop calling me that? My name is Tom.”

“Tom.” The word was foreign on her tongue. She’d never thought of him by that name, but nor had she ever believed she would know what it felt like to have her lips branded by his. Riddle was utterly forbidden, but perhaps Tom was not. Perhaps Tom was the answer to a prayer she’d never dared to utter. “Okay, Tom.”

“I’ll see you around, Hermione.”

His smile was an infectious promise as he backed away from her, and her answering grin held all the hope she dared to hold.


	9. Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for being here. Your support means the world. Shorter, but more to come soon. Please stay safe.

~*~ Nine ~*~

Hermione’s heart was still beating out of her chest as she walked with Aurelia to the girls’ dormitory that evening. She’d never imagined she’d be using the Occlumency skills Malfoy had taught her against him, but that’s exactly what she’d done for an entire afternoon. He’d told her he actively avoided her mind, but with the memories of Tom’s lips devouring her, she knew better than to leave such information to chance. If Malfoy found out… well, she wasn’t entirely sure what he would do, but she knew she didn’t want to find out. Hermione had come to rely on him, to need him in this foreign land. And she’d promised him. She’d looked into those haunted eyes and promised she wouldn’t let Tom destroy everything. She’d betrayed Malfoy the moment she’d given in and that was one more failure, further proof of how little integrity she had left. Even her word was meaningless now.

Malfoy would find out. He was too clever, frozen glare missing nothing, intuition dangerously attuned to Hermione. He would know and her precarious position would tilt beyond the precipice, her world ripped out from under her yet again. But not tonight. Tonight she used his teachings against him. Tonight she basked in the glow that Tom’s lips left in their wake. Tonight she forgot the pain, the infinite loss, if only for a few grains of sand in the hourglass of her life.

“You look like you just got front row tickets to the Quidditch World Cup.” Aurelia’s sweet voice cut through her ruminations. The other girl sank onto her bed, lips twisted in a knowing smile. “So tell me, which one of them made you as lovesick as Amortentia?”

Hermione blinked at her. Damn Slytherins and their cunning observational skills. “Which one?”

Aurelia rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Hermione. It’s either Dacian or Tom, both of them look at you like you’re the bloody resurrection of Salazar Slytherin.”

That would be Tom. But that wasn’t Aurelia’s point, and Hermione could hardly continue to play dumb. No, Aurelia was just as observant as every other member of the serpents’ pit. She sighed, her teeth worrying her bottom lip as she stared across at her… friend? Aurelia was the closest thing she had to a friend, the only girl she’d been close to since… Ginny? There had been Harry and Ron, but given her sexual history with both of them, it hadn’t been anything as clear cut as friendship between them. And Malfoy. He was something else entirely, caught between enemy and friend, nemesis and temptation. She couldn’t bear to think about how important he’d become to her, how deep this betrayal would cut.

“Can you keep a secret?” The words were out before she could think better.

Aurelia’s honey eyes flared with interest. “This is Slytherin, secrets are our currency. We know how to keep silent.”

“Tom.”

It was only one word, but the rush of relief that followed the admission threatened to bowl her over. Hermione sank to her bed, taking the deepest breath she dared, feeling the tension melt from her shoulders, the joy swimming through her veins at the memory of him against her.

“Holy mother of Merlin,” Aurelia gasped. “How was it?”

“Bloody brilliant,” Hermione gushed, the floodgates crashing open. “I’ve never felt so alive in my entire life. He just… lights my fire.” It was a hopelessly inadequate way to explain how deeply Tom had branded himself upon her. Hermione giggled, giggled in a way she didn’t remember, in a way that made her feel thirteen again.

“He’s knocked the sense right out of you, hasn’t he?” Aurelia murmured, wry smile painting her delicate lips. “What does Dacian think?”

It was a shot of ice through her euphoric veins. “He doesn’t know and he can’t. Aurelia, it is imperative that you don’t tell him.”

“Dacian isn’t an idiot, Hermione.” Aurelia’s tone wasn’t kind, her honey eyes wary. “Tom may look at you like he wants to eat you for lunch, but Dacian looks at you like he’ll burn the world to save you.”

“What?” Hermione could hardly imagine Malfoy looking at her with anything but poorly concealed ire and annoyance.

“Tom wants you, but Dacian cares, so much he can’t begin to hide it. He won’t take this sitting down.”

That was utterly impossible. They’d only been here two months and Malfoy sure as hell hadn’t had any feelings for her beyond disgust when he hitched a ride to the past. Sure, he was protective, but that served his interests. If she was found out, so was he. They were tied together in their effort to survive this hair-brained mission that had spun so far off axis Hermione wasn’t sure how she could possibly recover her original intention. But that was it. That’s where Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger started and ended, an alliance of convenience.

“You’re mistaken.” The frost in her tone brooked no argument and Aurelia recoiled as if stung. Hermione felt a momentary pang of regret, but pushed on. “Dacian and I have a long history, but at no point in time have we ever been anything but colleagues. Even friendship is not part of our relationship.”

“But—”

“No. Whatever you think you’re sensing, you’re wrong.” Hermione let out a weary sigh. “Please don’t tell anyone what I shared.”

Aurelia stared back at her, a foreign emotion dampening her bright gaze. It took Hermione a moment to realize it was disappointment. “I won’t say a word, Miss Gable.”

They didn’t speak for the rest of the night, the guilt of it gnawing at Hermione even as the ghost of Tom’s lips danced over her skin. But the last thing she thought of as oblivion swallowed her was desperate stormy eyes behind midnight fringe and just how far off track she’d strayed.


	10. Ten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your continued support. Please stay safe.

~*~ Ten ~*~

Hermione kept the truth hidden as the weeks melted into each other, October chills claiming the lingering vestiges of summer. Leaves crunched under boots and the sun sank lower every day, heavy as her soul. She’d thought it would be a burden, but not a knot in her gut that never quite disappeared. She’d thought the heated moments would drive the itch of unease from beneath her skin just as they fulfilled her need to connect. But no. In the heat of the moment she might forget everything but those sinful lips dragging across her aching skin, but as soon as Tom was gone, the torment would begin anew, fueled further by whatever forbidden tryst she’d just experienced.

Malfoy clearly knew something was wrong. She’d been distant and overly moody from the moment Tom had thrown her completely off course, but Malfoy hadn’t asked. That very fact never failed to send dread coursing through her veins. Did his lack of curiosity mean he already knew? And if so, why hadn’t he confronted her yet? If not, why wasn’t he prying? He’d been so adamant about her learning Occlumency and it didn’t seem natural that he would suddenly ignore her completely. So she spent evening meals boring holes through his unnatural midnight hair, trying to see into his brain. Of course, Hermione was aware that staring at someone’s head didn’t lead to any real knowledge of their thoughts, but she wasn’t about to attempt any sort of Legilimency on him and simply asking any sort of question was even more unpalatable. Hence the staring. She stared at him and Aurelia stared at her, judgment heavy in her honey eyes.

“I believe we have an appointment in the library, Miss Gable?”

The dulcet tones of Tom’s baritone sent shivers and heat cascading through her. Hermione swallowed as she glanced over her shoulder to where he stood, an elegant dark brow raised in silent question. Right. They had a proper excuse to spend some time together since they’d been paired together for a DADA assignment the previous day.

Malfoy tilted his head, dull eyes scanning the length of Tom before pivoting to stare at Hermione. “You didn’t mention anything, Gable.”

“Wasn’t aware you were her keeper, Mallet,” Tom replied, smug grin tugging at his full lips.

Hermione sent him a cutting glare and the smile faded, leaving only a self-satisfied glint behind cobalt eyes. Malfoy didn’t bother to look at either of them, fiddling instead with the empty bowl of stew in front of him. “No, I most definitely am not.”

Hermione kept her focus on Malfoy even as she began to gather her things. His eyes were a tempest of icy daggers as he stared down at the remains of his dinner. Her pulse hammered at double time as she backed away from the table, bag in hand. He had to know. That was the only possible reason for such a reaction and yet he still hadn’t said a word to her about Tom. Hadn’t said much of anything at all in the past few weeks.

“Hermione,” Tom murmured from beside her, his hand coming to rest at the base of her spine, eliciting a very different jump in her heartrate.

She shook her head, willing Malfoy out of it, as she turned to face him. “Sorry, he’s a bit more ornery than usual these days.”

Tom guided them out of the Great Hall, his lips dropping to the shell of her ear. “I honestly couldn’t give less of a shit about Dacian, Hermione.” The statement was punctuated by a drag of his lips down the sensitive skin behind her ear.

Hermione barely stifled the moan his ministrations evoked as they turned the corner toward the library. She could feel the amused huff of air as he clearly noticed her struggle. She swallowed forcibly and took a small step away from him, giving her the space she needed to reign in the mouthwatering effect he always seemed to have on her.

“We have an actual project to work on, Tom. The rest will have to…” She glanced up through her lashes to meet his hungry stare and immediately regretted it. She looked resolutely at the stone wall beyond him. “Will have to wait.”

He let out a hearty chuckle, but didn’t try to persuade her otherwise as they traveled the rest of the way to the library in companionable silence. She’d already gathered the needed books before dinner, so it was only a matter of perusing the material, which they would likely make quick work of.

He might be fated to be the next Dark Lord—a fact Hermione wasn’t entirely convinced of anymore—but Tom Riddle was certainly not unintelligent. After spending the better part of a month with him, albeit mostly with his tongue down her throat, Hermione was absolutely sure of that. When they were paired in a setting that required wit and reasoning, he was sharper than the Ravenclaws, often first to reach the answer and usually in a unique way that had the professors fawning over his every word. She hadn’t wanted to be impressed by him; she really hadn’t wanted to find the very taste of him addictive or the scent of cloves arousing, but she was helpless against the tide that was Tom Riddle. Helpless in a way that scared her, that electrified her and that would perhaps destroy her. She wasn’t naïve enough to pretend the ending wouldn’t be a bitter one for her, but every moment that gave sweet satisfaction instead of empty despair, she would take, would cling to until the pain faded, until her soul was merely cracked instead of cleaved.

The scratch of Tom’s quill against the parchment in front of him brought her back. Hermione didn’t remember sitting down at the edge of the restricted section, a fact that likely should perturb her, but didn’t. By the second year of the war it hadn’t been uncommon for her to find herself in a location without truly remembering how she’d gotten there. It seemed a facet of how her mind coped with the inexorable stress of combat. Now perhaps she was merely a school girl day dreaming of her handsome beau. Hermione shook her head as a bitter taste consumed her mouth, like she’d stuffed it full of Galleons. She could not be so deluded as to believe that.

Tom paused, angling his fathomless stare toward her. “Are you okay?”

Her mouth still felt full of metal, acrid and wrong. “Yes.”

“Don’t lie to me.” The words held the hint of chill behind them, but his expression was soft, his eyes a brilliant sapphire.

“It just happens sometimes… I lose time.” Saying it aloud made her feel as crazy as it sounded. She half expected Tom to shoot back his chair and flee the library.

He merely stared back at her. “Because of the war.”

“I… I think so.” She’d never talked about this, not even with Harry. “It started… during the war.”

Tom shifted, his hand trailing the length of her jumper-clad arm before twining with hers on the table. “There are things I know you will not speak about, that I imagine you attempt not to think about. The effects of those things are beyond your control, and likely mine. That you are here—with me—is all I require of you.”

“You don’t think I’m insane?”

His fingers traced enticing patterns on the sensitive skin of her wrist. “I’ve told you before, you’re beautiful. What you’ve endured undoubtably changed you, but you are all the more beautiful for it. I will never judge you for your scars.”

It was everything she craved to hear, each word a balm against the pain, the pernicious press of despair that had taken up permanent residence about her heart. “Thank you.”

He nodded, raising her hand to trace fire across it with his lips. “Always,” he murmured against her skin. As he lowered their clasped fingers, his features morphed, making him brutally handsome but edged in danger, entirely different from the boy who’d spoken such soft words of reassurance. “They want to kill you.”

A chill skated beneath her skin and she pulled away from his steely grip to tangle her hands together. It seemed an odd thing for him to say, considering the amount of killing war entailed. Hermione frowned at him. “That is half the point in battle.”

“No,” he shook his head, ebony waves falling loose to curtain his crystalline stare, “that’s not what I mean. I mean the point of this war is to kill people like you. To kill Muggle-born witches and wizards. That must be a terrible thing to face every time you… fight.”

For a moment she couldn’t breathe. “What?”

“I’m not an idiot, Hermione. The last Gable to attend Hogwarts was only ten years ago. Unless they used a time turner to create offspring, that isn’t your name.” He didn’t seem the least bit upset by either her lie or her birth.

“You don’t hate me?”

For once, Tom looked startled, the usual unflappable composure shaken for an instant as he stared across at her. “Why in Merlin’s name would I hate you?”

“I lied…” He merely raised a brow in response. She sighed, acknowledging that lies were something of the norm in Slytherin. “I’m a Mudblood.”

One of his eyes twitched and his lips went thin as the word fell from her lips. “Don’t say that. Don’t ever use that foul word to describe yourself again.”

Hermione nearly bit through her tongue as surprise slammed her jaw shut. This was Tom bloody Riddle, she might be letting his hands do damning things to her in the dark corners of the school, but he was still the boy who became Voldemort. She hadn’t talked to him about blood purity, so whatever view he currently professed was the one he’d had before they arrived in the past. And based on his response to her use of the slur, he wasn’t the bigot they’d all assumed him to be.

“But…” she tried to remember the conversations she’d overheard in the Slytherin common room, sure she remembered any number of damning statements made to his fellow pupils.

“If you’re thinking of all the malarkey I have to spew to get Malfoy and rest to fall in line, don’t make the mistake of thinking that isn’t simply a means to an end. Power can’t exist in a vacuum. I need those sods, but do not mistake that need for like and certainly not for belief in their narrow and quite frankly idiotic beliefs. You and I are two of the most powerful people I know and neither of us is Pureblooded.”

If kissing him had tilted her world upside down, this shattered it entirely. He wasn’t a hateful bigot, a monster who believed in blood purity above all else. So what had happened? What had taken his means to an end and twisted it until it became a battle cry on the lips of silver-masked terrors? How had Tom Riddle gone so utterly wrong?

She stared into hypnotic sapphire, trying to see. “What about Myrtle?”

Tom flinched, gaze shuttering before opening back to her with liquid pain cutting through. “It was meant to scare them, to keep them in line. I was only a fifth year, how was I to control the seventh years? I needed to scare them.”

“From the whispers I’ve heard, you did.” Honestly, she hadn’t heard much from her housemates, but Tom seemed to accept she had some knowledge of the events of the previous year. Hermione wasn’t about to tell him she knew he’d framed Hagrid, but it seemed that all of Slytherin, at least, was perfectly aware of who exactly had opened the Chamber of Secrets.

“I also accidentally killed a girl and sent the oaf who used to be groundskeeper to stand for my crimes.” Tom worried his bottom lip for a long moment before releasing a shuddering sigh. “Not my finest moment, but it’s nice to tell someone, finally.”

Hermione couldn’t have looked away from his desperate stare if she tried. Her pulse fluttered at the base of her neck in a frantic staccato of anticipation and… arousal. She could not possibly find what he’d done arousing and she realized quickly that she didn’t. It wasn’t the facts that made her palms clammy or her skin tingle; it was the confession. That Tom Riddle had admitted to her the full extent of his crimes, that he had bared some part of his twisted soul to her excited her. She swallowed, mouth suddenly bereft of moisture.

“Why tell me?” Her voice was barely a croak.

“Why hide from you?” Tom countered, a strong hand pulling her to him, settling her on his lap, her knees splayed to either side of his hips. Nothing could stop the tremble that wracked her frame as her skirt rode up, as the heat of him seared into her core. His lips were temptation personified as they bit and sucked their way to her ear. “Can’t you feel what lies between us? Can’t you feel how right this is? You’re utterly mine.”

If she’d had even half her senses, she might have protested such a possessive statement, but she had none of them. Instead she let the remaining ache of reality be chased away by his hands, by the clever sweep of his honeyed tongue, by the promise of oblivion. She was so lost in the moment that even the eyes glutted with tempestuous storms boring through her meant nothing at all.


	11. Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all. You're amazing. Please stay safe and well.

~*~ Eleven ~*~

The brand of Tom’s elegant fingers against her skin was still fresh, still burning holes through every facet of her as Hermione collapsed against the wall beside the Slytherin portrait hole. They had never gone any further than hands skimming below clothing and tongues twining, but it felt as if he’d taken her, owned her body and soul in the most complete way possible. She didn’t dare to imagine what it would feel like if they truly gave in to their basest desires. Would her mind still be hers by the time Tom Riddle had fully claimed her? Logically it was insane to think sex could change her like that, but the effect Tom had on her was like nothing she’d ever encountered.

Groaning, she ran a hand over her swollen lips and tried to think of something other than drowning in sapphire eyes. Whatever plan she’d had up on that tower was gone now. She knew she’d never be able to kill Tom. If she wasn’t going to kill him, then she had to save him. It was the only way to prevent the hell that was her past and his future from playing out. But that was no simple task. Killing him was easy. One spell, one poison, one unlucky moment and the job was done. Turning him from his darker nature, whittling his ambition into something tenable, that was something else entirely. Hermione was no fool—despite her weakness for his dark seductions—she knew exactly how strong his yearning for power burned, how determined he was to become the master of the other boys, of even Dumbledore. Tom would not be satisfied with only Hermione as his prize; he would accept nothing short of the world. And so she would have to give it to him. Give it to him in a way that didn’t send horrors ricocheting through time and space, that left the ground unbloodied and fertile not glut with bodies and sorrow.

But how? How could she save the world and Tom? Another groan escaped her lips. Her mind was spinning in circles, chaos threatening to drive away the last of her sanity.

A warm hand on her shoulder had her startling, a wave of nausea rolling through her as she looked up into stormy eyes. “We need to talk.”

Hermione wanted to run. To turn away from Malfoy and keep moving until her legs gave out, until she was far away from this place, until she could rest. But instead she nodded and let him take her hand and lead her up the stairs and into their hidden sanctuary.

Malfoy’s hand slipped from hers as he faced her in front of the grand fireplace the Room of Requirement had conjured for them. Fine midnight strands fell across the pale panes of his skin, the firelight making the angle of his cheekbones more severe, the pout of his lips more sensual. But it was his eyes she could not look away from. The emotion in their stormy depths was more than she could handle, enough to make her stomach roil and her throat parch.

Her breath was caught in her lungs, held captive by the accusation and betrayal pouring out of those broken eyes. He didn’t move to speak, or even blink. The only motion was the tic of his jaw in rhythm with the flutter of her pulse.

Seconds dragged into minutes as he simply stared at her. The heat that Tom had evoked was vanquished by that stare, leaving only an empty chill running through her veins. Her teeth worried her bottom lip, her hands twisted, her knees knocked and yet still he stared. She couldn’t stand it, couldn’t stand the horrible truth behind his eyes, the bone-chilling knowledge that this was her fault.

After a log cracked in the fire for the hundredth time, she yielded, taking a tentative step into the space between them.

“I didn’t mean to.”

His eyes only became harder, his jaw tighter. “And what exactly did you mean to do, Hermione Granger?”

“I…” There was no defense for her choices. She’d been selfish and she still didn’t regret it. Tom satisfied her, erased the aches of her fractured soul so completely she almost felt whole again.

Malfoy wasn’t a friend; he shouldn’t matter to her at all. She hadn’t asked for him to come with her; he was nothing but a complication. Her chest tightened, her denials hollow. She didn’t want him to matter, but if he didn’t, shame wouldn’t be creeping beneath her skin, burning like embers beneath his penetrating stare. Yet another truth she’d buried deep, lost in her escape from suffering.

She looked up at the man before her, truly looked for the first time since they’d tumbled into this precarious place. Beyond the disgust and accusation, the burning knowledge of her betrayal, he looked haggard, tired in a world-weary way that only infinite suffering could evoke. His skin was ashen, his mesmerizing eyes sunken and shadowed. He was healthier than when they’d arrived, his shoulders broader and his cheeks less sallow, but no less haunted.

The war had taken everyone and everything from her. Was it possible it had taken an equal share from him? She’d assumed his status as an elite Death Eater would have spared him certain scars, but now she wasn’t sure. He’d been protecting his mind against Voldemort, so he’d had something to hide, something to lose.

Hermione swallowed, finally looking away. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry,” he spit the word, venom coating his tongue. “You promised me.”

“What does my promise matter to you?” The truth of her broken word was beside the point now.

He swallowed, smothering whatever retort was on the tip of his tongue. His stare raked over her, flaying her open with its frostbitten edges. “I suppose my word means little to you. So why should yours mean anything to me.” She could see his jaw clench, the muscles spasming. “Fine, but you owed me the truth. You’ve been with him for weeks now and it takes me confronting you before you’re willing to admit what you’ve done. The risk you’ve put both of us at. Did you even consider how this would affect me?”

It would have been better if he’d struck her, if he’d showed an inkling of the violence lurking beneath his skin. But he just kept looking at her, a cold and quiet anger behind hard eyes. She wished desperately she could be sorry, that she could regret Tom’s lips upon her own. But she couldn’t. No matter how well she understood the danger she’d placed Malfoy in—without his consent—she couldn’t.

“Why should I care, Malfoy? Why am I even apologizing to you?” It was easier to cover the shame with anger than to admit just how callous her choices had become. “You and I aren’t friends. You hate me. I understand I’m useful to you, but I know that a day will come when I’m not needed, when you’ll turn against me. So what do I owe you? Nothing.”

He turned pointedly away from her. She watched him carefully cross the room to settle onto the far side of the loveseat. He arranged his left leg out in front of him, bringing his foot to rest on an ottoman. Malfoy took a shuddering breath and when he turned to face her again, the brittle anger was gone, replaced by a weariness that tore into her.

“I don’t have anything left, Granger. Even before we traveled back here. It’s the reason I came along. There was nothing for me there, only torture and death. So I leapt, quite literally, at the chance for something else. I didn’t care where you were going, only that it wouldn’t be that anymore.” His voice was even, but barely audible above the quiet crackle of the fire.

Her anger disintegrated, the shame rearing up, ripping her flustered excuses to shreds. She cautiously closed the distance between them, settling at the opposite end of the loveseat. “You didn’t want to be a Death Eater.”

“No, but I think you already knew that,” he murmured, eyes locking with hers. Where there’d been accusation, only sorrow remained.

Her thoughts tangled, her memories of his atrocities during the war a stark contrast to the man sitting beside her. “But you killed.”

“So did you.”

He was right. It wasn’t the killing that made him so feared, so high on the Order’s kill-not-capture list. “You tortured people, Malfoy. You tortured them until they were so broken there was nothing left of their minds or their bodies. You broke them beyond the need for information. What you did… it’s not human.”

She hadn’t thought about it. Had refused to let the memories of his victims cross her mind since he’d threatened her at the top of the tower. She’d put it all aside for the mission, for her sanity, but now the truth was filtering through like water through sand, impossible to ignore. How could he be angry with her, hurt by her, when he wasn’t even remotely human? When there was no way he could possibly feel what his face showed.

“I did what I had to. To survive.” His teeth ground audibly in the quiet room. “Do you think I wanted to do that? That it was my choice to destroy people from the inside out? Do you think I’m just another Bellatrix Lestrange?”

Three months ago she would have said yes. Now, now she wasn’t sure. “I don’t know…”

“You know me, Hermione.” Her first name on his lips was a shock, but it sounded natural, like he’d always called her that.

She shook her head, focus swinging away from those eyes that said impossible things, that cracked her in ways she was utterly unprepared to mend. “I don’t know you at all, Malfoy. All I know is that you haven’t chosen to hurt me since we’ve arrived. You’ve kept my secret, but that’s it. I don’t know anything else.”

“I would never hurt you,” he insisted, voice a raspy plea.

“How in the world would I know that?” she cried, hands wringing. “Everything I’ve heard—”

“Is not the entire truth,” Malfoy snapped, his leg falling from its perch as he lurched toward her.

His wince at the motion was barely visible as his face hovered mere centimeters from hers, but there was no hiding the flash of pain from her. Maybe she did know him better than she’d allowed herself to believe. She leaned away from his desperation. “There were witnesses, Malfoy. You destroyed people for sport.”

“For sport!?!” He scoffed, hot breath searing across her cheeks. “There are things you don’t know, Granger. Things you will never understand. Things you should be bloody well grateful that you will never know.”

Malfoy was too close now, assaulting her senses and twisting her heart into unfamiliar knots. She put up a hand to push him away, but instead it froze the moment it settled over his frantically beating heart, the warmth of his chest melting into her chilled skin.

“Then explain to me.”

“I… I can’t,” he confessed, turning away from her in a sudden motion that left her feeling achingly bereft.

Hermione sighed, slumping back against the couch. She wasn’t about to volunteer any information about her experiences to anyone either. Tom had never pried beyond the most tangential questions, had gone out of his way to allow her the space she needed, giving her the ability to avoid any true memories. She might have lived through the hell, but the memories weren’t something she could face. They were a blur of things that had stolen every last piece of her and no matter what, she would not let them come into focus. It would be too much and there was still work to be done before she could shatter to pieces and finally be free.

But did she believe Malfoy? Was there more to his story than the list of atrocities she’d heard? Was he as damaged as Hermione, perhaps even more so? Her gaze dropped to his leg. He hid it well enough, but she knew he favored it, knew he couldn’t stand for extended periods of time, knew that there was suffering behind those stormy eyes that even she could not understand. So was it any leap to believe that his cruelties were not as they seemed? Or was he simply a consummate actor?

She stared at his turned back, gaze roaming over his hunched shoulders and bowed head. They’d found a way to put the dye mixture in his shampoo, so his hair was midnight as ever, foreign and familiar now. Her hand hovered over his shoulder for a long moment before dropping to rest there. Malfoy stiffened immediately but didn’t pull away from her touch.

“I truly didn’t mean to endanger you. Tom just… happened.”

“He’s going to hurt you.”

“I know.”

“Then why?” His gaze swung over his shoulder, eyes dull.

There was nothing left but to be honest. “He makes me forget.”

Malfoy held her gaze, his jaw working silently before he nodded. “I can understand the appeal of forgetting. But this isn’t worth it, Granger. Riddle is dangerous. You came here to kill him for Merlin’s sake.”

“He hasn’t tried to get in my head since we’ve been…” She couldn’t call it dating and snogging seemed too simplistic. “Together.”

“That you know of,” Malfoy countered, shifting to fully face her. Her hand was still on his shoulder, but she couldn’t bring herself to remove it. “Riddle is smarter than either of us, Granger. He’s clever and he’s willing to do whatever it takes to meet his ends. That includes using you.”

Her teeth dug into her bottom lip, stemming the urge to defend Tom. Malfoy was right. Tom might be giving her exactly what she needed, but it would be naïve to think he wasn’t getting something out of it too. “I’m being careful.”

“I sincerely hope you’re talking about your mind and not…” he trailed off, color chasing across his wan features.

“Malfoy,” she hissed, cheeks warm.

“I mean I hope you’re being careful in that respect too,” he admitted, searching her face.

“We haven’t. But I know how to take care of myself.”

“Oh.” He licked his lips, focus suddenly everywhere but her face. “I just assumed because of your… relationship with Potter…”

“That I’m some kind of slag?” She didn’t know whether to be amused or annoyed by his conjecture. It was rude of him to assume she’d slept with Tom, but Malfoy had been front and center in plenty of her more lurid memories. She settled for watching him squirm under her disapproving glare.

He startled her when he shook his head vehemently, midnight stands falling across his wide eyes. “Merlin, no. I would never think that. Finding sexual satisfaction with a consenting partner does not make you or anyone else a whore. Ever.”

“Okay, then.” She had no idea what to say in response to his passionate retort, especially considering the insults she distinctly remembered. The hand on his shoulder was suddenly too hot and she snatched it back, ignoring the hurt that flashed through wintery eyes. “I guess that’s settled then.”

“That is very far from settled, but there is likely nothing I can do to persuade you to alter course.” He sighed, moving away from her. “I can only ask that you explain to me what our new plan will be. Lover or not, I no longer see you killing Riddle.”

The room was suddenly frigid despite the fire mere meters away. “I don’t know.”

He put his leg back on the ottoman. “Yes, you do.”

“I want to save him.” It sounded ridiculous out loud. Far more absurd than it had in her head or even the first time she’d suggested it in this very room.

Malfoy just nodded, as if he’d been expecting the words. And perhaps he had. He seemed to understand her, not in every respect, but in more ways than she was comfortable admitting. “It won’t work.”

“He told me about killing Myrtle.” Hermione wasn’t sure what his confession actually meant, but it seemed important Malfoy understand how much Tom trusted her.

“A tragic accident, I’m sure.” Bitter eyes rolled as he shook his head. “Don’t fall for such flobber worm snot, Granger.”

She thought about sharing that Tom knew about her blood status, but the words wouldn’t quite form on her tongue. She might be willing to admit Malfoy wasn’t the monster he seemed, but delving into blood status with him seemed a poor choice. Instead she replied, “He seemed sincere, Malfoy. He didn’t have to share anything with me, but he chose to.”

“All the better to lure you into trusting him,” Malfoy countered, eyes narrowing. “If you’re going to do this, Granger, and I really think you shouldn’t, you’re going to have to assume the worst of him. Both to protect yourself and to prevent any of his nefarious plans from coming to fruition.”

“But—”

“No.” He stared her down, suddenly all dangerous edges and flashing eyes. “This is still war, Hermione. Do not mistake it for anything else.”

Her heart constricted as she finally nodded. “Fine.”

They found no solution, no sure way to sway Tom into the light, but they kept trying, talking until the small window glowed and dawn was upon them. Only then did they cease, leaving separately, neither quite ready to face the day ahead.


	12. Twelve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have found the vast range of responses to this story both humbling and fascinating. Each of you bring so much to the table. Thank you for taking the time to share your opinion; it makes this experience substantially more interesting and rewarding. This chapter has a bit of everything in it. The M rating is earned for the first time, so if that's not your cup of tea please feel free to skim over that section. I would not recommend skipping the chapter in its entirety as a lot more happens than the sexual content. I hope you are all staying safe.

~*~ Twelve ~*~

Hermione concentrated on the steps of the waltz, the enchanted snowflakes shimmering in the air as Malfoy twirled her around the Great Hall, transformed from dining room to Winter Ballroom. Her palm was sticky against his, his arm burning a hole through the thin fabric of her ruby gown on her lower back, but Hermione pushed the ghosts of butterflies back into oblivion. One two three, one two three. Just the movement of their feet, not the way the crystalline flakes settled enchantingly in his dark locks or kissed his lashes. She might be on speaking terms with him again, but such reactions had no place in the chaos of her brain.

He leveled a sour expression at her as they rounded the dance floor. “Remind me again why I’m your date to this. Riddle is staring at me like he’ll be putting me under the Cruciatus in seconds.”

“This was his idea. He’s not going to torture you for doing what he wanted.”

“You’d be surprised,” Malfoy bit back, glancing warily over her shoulder.

Hermione sighed, adjusting her grip on his shoulder, the muscle taut beneath her slim fingers. “Relax. Tom simply wants to avoid unwanted attention from the members of his… group. Having a girlfriend doesn’t fit into his plans for school domination yet, so you get the pleasure of being my date in public.”

“And he trusts me with this information why? He isn’t the least bit worried I’ll steal his girlfriend?” His tone was utterly neutral as he spoke, but his focus skittered away from her face, suddenly fascinated by the snow falling above them.

She let out a snort that was entirely unladylike, but impossible to contain. “I was under the impression you’d rather be burned at the stake multiple times than do something so vile as kiss me. Regardless, Tom doesn’t seem think you’re a threat to him, in this regard anyway.”

Tempestuous eyes snapped to hers. “Rather be burned at the stake? Really?”

“From the time we were children, you’ve made it perfectly clear you are not interested in me that way. Ever. I doubt anything has changed.”

His mouth pursed, full lips turning down. Hermione looked away before he caught her staring and locked gazes with Aurelia Greengrass, who was watching them from an alcove. It took all of Hermione’s self-control not to flinch. She hadn’t had a proper conversation with Aurelia since the night Hermione had insisted Malfoy couldn’t possibly care about her. They’d spoken plenty—the necessity of being both housemates and roommates—but of nothing of substance. Aurelia’s glare spoke volumes now as her eyes flicked to Malfoy and then back to Hermione.

For reasons that Hermione couldn’t entirely fathom, Tom had insisted on keeping their relationship clandestine despite Malfoy knowing. He’d said something about his followers not being ready for a woman to supplant them and that Hermione was simply too intimidating at present. She didn’t believe a word of it, but the added benefit of hiding the relationship from Dumbledore had her following Tom’s lead despite the dirty looks from both Aurelia and Malfoy when they thought she wasn’t looking.

Malfoy still thought she was one lip lock away from signing their death warrant and Aurelia, well, Aurelia was angry and Hermione hadn’t figured out how to apologize without explaining truths best left unshared. It was one thing to imply things about the war, another thing entirely to explain just how much pain existed between her and Malfoy. They might be civil now, perhaps almost friends, but nothing could take away his cruelty, the way he’d made her feel like she didn’t belong in this world.

And the war years. How could she ever tell Aurelia what it felt like to take a life, how it split you and how those fissures just kept fracturing until you were more ruined than whole? How could she tell her that Hermione lost time more days than not, the abyss that was her mind rebelling at the shadows that coalesced just beyond her control, the memories she could not recall, but could feel deep in her bones? How could she tell her that only physical pleasure made the ache of darkness fade, driving her to pursue the feel of flesh against hers beyond reason? How could she tell her the boy with the midnight hair and stormy eyes, the boy she was so sure cared for Hermione, was a monster, capable of the foulest magics, ruthless in the pursuit of pain?

And then there was Tom. The boy Aurelia knew was trouble. And yet she didn’t know the half of it and Hermione knew better than share the truth of his destiny. That, at least, was not written in the stars. Her past, and Malfoy’s, might be history, its imprint impossible to erase, but Tom’s horrors had yet to come. She had thrown out all other options the minute their lips met and now there was nothing left to do but save the boy who gave her the release her troubled soul craved.

“Hermione?”

Malfoy sounded concerned and Hermione realized she’d been absently staring into space and had missed whatever he’d just said. She shook her head, elaborate coiffure swaying gently at the movement. “Sorry, what?”

His teeth worried his bottom lip, a look in his stormy eyes she couldn’t quite identify. “I don’t find you repulsive.”

She missed a step, stumbling into him. His chest was hot against her palms, his fingers burning trails of fire down her arms as he righted her. “But…”

“I said a lot of idiotic things when I was a child. I’d thank you to forget them as best you can.” They were back in a proper waltz hold, but Hermione’s breath was still caught somewhere in her chest, trapped by the rapid tattoo of her heart. Malfoy didn’t seem to notice as he continued, “I think you know me well enough by now to know that I’m not that ignorant schoolboy anymore.”

No, he was so much worse than that boy. That boy had been pathetic and hurtful, but insubstantial. The man before her was a war criminal. She caught a glimpse of Tom’s heated stare over Malfoy shoulder, the smirk on his lips nearly enough to make her stumble again. The irony was not lost on her that in this reality, Malfoy was the more heinous of the two. Tom had accidently murdered Myrtle, but that was it. What he could be was nothing but a possibility.

Hermione sighed, focusing back on those solemn eyes drowning in a desperate emotion she couldn’t fully grasp. “I know that. I just thought you’d be even more averse to me than ever. Especially after all the things you… did.”

He growled, low and dangerous. “I told you what you’ve heard isn’t the entire truth.”

“And you’ve refused to set the record straight, Malfoy,” she hissed, risking the use of his proper name.

The pain splayed across his features was impossible to miss, different from the usual grimace his leg evoked. It was gone an instant later, his expression glacially calm. “There are some things best left undisturbed, Granger.”

“Then you can hardly fault me for reaching erroneous conclusions if you won’t provide the necessary information.”

“Fine.”

He didn’t say another word and Hermione wasn’t inclined to speak either. They were spared the painful silence mere minutes later when Dumbledore tapped gently on Malfoy’s shoulder.

“Might you share a dance with an old man, Ms. Gable?” The professor’s usually twinkling eyes were sharper, cutting in a way that made Hermione’s blood chill.

Malfoy’s eyes were narrowed, fleeting unease contorting his angular features before he reined in the reaction. By the time Dumbledore’s discerning gaze turned to him, he was the picture of composure, bland smile and vacant stare in place. He nodded at the older man, but didn’t speak. It took Hermione a moment to realize he was deferring to her.

Dumbledore stared down at her expectantly and it became clear she had only one true option, especially with Malfoy bowing out of the exchange. “Of course, Professor.”

Malfoy melted into the crowd as Dumbledore shifted to take his place. The professor was shorter and slighter, but his grip was firm as he began to lead her through a foxtrot. Hermione kept her gaze firmly rooted on his right ear, noting the awed stares of the other students as they cut through the throng of dancers.

“I imagine it’s rather uncommon to find you on the dance floor, Professor,” she commented.

A wistful smile gripped his thin lips for a moment. “These days, certainly, but as a younger man, I had quite the passion for the ballroom. My sister… was fond of dancing and I was fond of her.”

A lump threatened to lodge in her throat. Ariana. Dumbledore was talking about Ariana. She knew the barest bones of the story, only what Harry had deemed necessary to share. The Dumbledore of her time would certainly never have mentioned his deceased sister. But this version was softer, less jaded, easier to mislead, more prone to sentiment. Hermione’s stomach churned at the thought, the reality of her deception hitting like a _reducto_ to the gut.

“But enough about me,” Dumbledore continued, eyes narrowing beneath half-moon spectacles. “How are you? I have noticed a great deal of… interaction between you and the young Mr. Riddle.”

“Oh?” Hermione couldn’t be sure what exactly he knew and she wasn’t about to admit one scrap of information more than she needed to.

He stared silently at her for a long moment. “Are you safe, Hermione? You would tell me if you were in trouble with Mr. Riddle wouldn’t you?”

Hermione masked the breath of relief that rushed into her lungs as best she could. If he was concerned for her safety, then he clearly did not know the full extent of her relationship with Tom. “We’ve been paired on several assignments and have worked well together. That does not mean the plan has been altered.”

What a lie that was. She kept her focus beyond the professor’s face, beyond the deception. And good she did, for a moment later the telltale sign of a headache pounded at her temples. She wasn’t sure whether to be concerned or not by the attempted invasion of her thoughts. She’d left her mind an open book for Dumbledore upon arrival, but that didn’t mean she’d intended to give him an all access pass to her head. Once again, she was thankful for the Occlumency training Malfoy had forced on her. Dumbledore might have cracked the door, but all he could access were the memories of her time with Tom in classes, none of which included any hint of the depths of their entanglement.

“If you’re sure you are safe.” He frowned down at her, spectacles shifting on his nose.

“I am.” She said the words slowly, casually, a hint of a smile at her lips. “I promise I’ll let you know the second I’m not.”

“Be careful, Ms. Gable,” Dumbledore replied before guiding them to the edge of the dance floor and letting her hand fall from his.

Hermione watched him go, waiting until he was obscured by the dancing masses to turn away, chest suddenly heavy. She’d barely taken a steadying breath when familiar fingers laced through hers and a deep baritone murmured against her ear.

“I think we’ve put in enough time to keep up appearances, don’t you think, precious?” She could hear the dark amusement in Tom’s sensual murmur.

His lips ghosted across the skin at the nape of her neck and it was all she could do not to wantonly moan in public. Her voice was a husky rasp when she finally had the control to reply, “Yes, definitely.”

She was done trying to understand Malfoy’s mercurial moods and hiding from Dumbledore’s keen stare. The oblivion that Tom’s lips would bring was exactly what she craved.

Tom’s smirk was wicked in all the right ways as he pulled her away from the masses and into the chill of the dungeons. They didn’t make it to the portrait hole before his hands were in her hair, ruining the elaborate chignon in mere seconds. His lips were everywhere, burning across her skin, inciting her breathing to a fever pitch. When he finally captured her mouth with his, she was putty in his hands, her body chasing every sensation he evoked with wanton abandon. They stumbled through the portrait hole, one of them managing a breathy whisper of the password. The stays on her dress were half undone, his fingers deft and full of promise against the flushed skin of her back.

The moment they were in Tom’s room his dress robes were on the ground, Hermione’s fingers tugging frantically at the buttons of his white dress shirt as he tore the emerald tie from around his neck. Their rapid pants filled the still air as his fingers continued their work on her dress. She undid his last infuriating button the same moment her dress cascaded to the floor. His hands were on her hips before she could even register the smooth expanse of his exposed skin, the hard lines of muscles shifting as he gripped her tightly. Hermione vaguely noted that he was stronger than she’d imagined, chiseled in ways only men who truly used their bodies could be.

She didn’t have time to dwell on Tom’s physique as his hands slipped from her hips to her thighs. She gasped as he easily lifted her, her throbbing core colliding with the press of his desire as she wrapped her legs about his lithe waist. He groaned, head falling forward to rest on her shoulder, tousled black waves teasing her sensitive skin. His tongue was hot against her neck a moment later as her back connected with the door, driving them closer together.

This time it was Hermione moaning, pleading for more in those desperate gasps. She could feel Tom smile against her neck, feel the not so subtle thrust of his pelvis against hers. “Tell me what you want, precious.”

A younger Hermione would have stumbled over the words, perhaps even blushed. But she was no longer a child and sex was not as precious as it had once been. “Fuck me, Tom.”

If he was surprised by her crude language or the sudden escalation of physicality between them, he didn’t let it show. Instead those dark eyes transformed to liquid sapphire as he stared down at her, the door still pressed against her back. He kept her balanced between him and the solid wood as one hand made quick work of his belt and remaining clothing. He didn’t bother to step out of the trousers that pooled at his ankles. With an iniquitous grin Tom tore her knickers away and Hermione trembled, a wave of unadulterated need coursing through every facet of her. Another moan tumbled from her lips and he chuckled, the vibrations of it resonating through her, building her craving to unprecedented levels. Whatever she might have experienced before was a pale specter to what was thrumming through her now. She could focus on nothing else but the hunger, the ravenous call of his flesh against hers.

One second he was tasting her lips again, devouring her breathy moans and the next he was staring into her eyes, buried to the hilt within her, her walls clenching around him. There was a moment of discomfort and then there was only liquid pleasure as he moved. He shifted his grasp on her, slowly changing angles until she cried out in an abrupt burst of pleasure. His sapphire eyes melted into her as his full lips twitched in satisfaction. Hermione’s nails dug into his shoulders, clawing in undiluted ecstasy as he proceeded to hit the mark again and again.

She was screaming in earnest now, unable to keep the response to his forceful ministrations muted. She was screaming and she didn’t care one bit who heard them. She was lost, pleasure a sinful oblivion to which she’d willingly surrendered. Tom’s lips were back on hers, perhaps to swallow her unfettered cries, but she hardly felt them compared to the hot fire building where he drove into her, relentless and fulfilling. When she shattered, muscles desperately gripping him, nails drawing blood and throat hoarse with a silent scream, he caught her, held her until the trembling abated. Then he did it again, only allowing himself to follow when she was spent, limp in his arms atop the bed they’d collapsed upon when their positions against the door and atop the desk had required too much strength to maintain.

Hermione could feel the pound of his heart against her cheek as she lay sprawled across Tom, their legs tangled together. It didn’t seem real. How could someone like Tom Riddle have given her the best sexual experience of her life? Whatever she’d done before, it had been a fraction of this, a pale imitation of the pleasure he’d unleashed within her. He had taken her beyond oblivion and into something headier and darker, something she would forever crave.

She drew an idle finger across his pale skin, tracing the contour of his pectorals. “Why didn’t we do this sooner?”

The deep chuckle had heat pooling between her legs all over again. “Because I was under the impression you didn’t want to. You always stopped me before our clothes started to come off. I thought perhaps you were a prude, waiting until after marriage. Clearly, I was mistaken.”

Hermione swallowed. She had stopped him, but because of who he was and what this union represented. If there’d been no going back after she’d kissed him, there was definitely no going back now that she knew how sinfully good he felt inside her. No, Hermione would not be harming this boy, this almost man, that lounged beside her.

She shifted, noticing the wetness caking her thighs and sighed. She could simply _evanesco_ the evidence away, but she needed to use the loo anyway. She dropped a sloppy kiss upon Tom’s still swollen lips and shifted away. “I need to run to the toilet. I’ll be back?”

He stared up a her through hooded eyes, dark lashes a striking contrast to luminous sapphire. He ran his tongue slowly and deliberately across his bruised bottom lip. “Yes, please.”

Hermione shuddered, caught in the promise of those words and the heat of his stare. Deliberately looking away, she pulled on his discarded shirt, not bothering with any other garments. The dance was likely still underway; they’d left within the first hour, and right now she honestly didn’t care if all of Slytherin knew she was shagging their king. Clearly neither did Tom since he did nothing but stare hungrily after her from the bed as she slipped from the room.

The nearest bath was the prefects’, but Hermione knew the password thanks to both Aurelia and Tom. She didn’t meet another soul on her way and it was deserted when she entered. Sighing in relief—she might not have cared who found out, but it was simpler if no one did—Hermione moved to unbutton the few she’d bothered to fasten on the way out of Tom’s room.

“So, you truly are fucking him.”

Her hand froze on the button, ice crawling through her veins. “What the bloody hell are you doing in here, Malfoy?”

He moved into her line of sight, lips pressed together in a hard line. “I followed you.”

“From Tom’s room?”

“From the dance.”

Her cheeks went hot at the implication. They hadn’t used any silencing spells and she hadn’t been the least bit quiet about expressing her pleasure. Biting her cheek, she ignored the sudden shame blossoming in her gut. “Why in Merlin’s name couldn’t I see you in the hallway or in here? I was about to…”

He rolled his eyes, the severe set of his jaw slackening for a second. “Why do you think I said something? I wasn’t going to let you… strip without knowing I was here. I’m not a pervert.”

“No. You just listen to Tom and I having sex,” she hissed, feeling suddenly naked in a way Tom’s shirt did nothing to fix.

Malfoy sighed, slender fingers gripping his temples for a long moment before he spoke. “Look, it was never my intention to intrude. I just wanted to make sure you made it back safely after Dumbledore accosted you. My room is in this hall too, so when I saw both of you in the hall, I ducked out. It’s hardly my fault you both chose to make more noise than a bloody battle. Once the… din… ceased, I knew it was safe to try and check in with you again, so I followed when you came here.”

“And why couldn’t I see you?” She didn’t have the energy to be angry with him for the stalkerish behavior. Malfoy had already confused her enough for one evening.

“A little trick I perfected during the war,” he admitted. “I can show you sometime when you’re wearing more clothes and my presence isn’t horribly inappropriate.”

It was Hermione’s turn to roll her eyes. “At least you’re aware of that. I’m fine, Malfoy. Okay?”

Stormy eyes traced every contour of her before he nodded. “Okay.”

“Good night, Malfoy.”

He backed toward the door, something akin to hurt cracking his façade for a long moment. Then he was shaking his head, a bittersweet smile that twisted her heartstrings gracing his lips. “Good night, Hermione.”

She barely felt the heat of the water as she rinsed the sweat and pleasure from her body. She barely even noticed the way her skin tingled as she slipped back into bed with Tom, his sculpted arms caging her against him. No, all she could seem to remember was that smile, so sad it made her heart ache. She drifted off to the steady rhythm of Tom’s heartbeat against her ear and Malfoy’s expression emblazoned on her eyelids.


	13. Thirteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am still so very impressed by all of you. Thank you for your comments, kudos, etc. This story is a long and winding road and really, we're still at the beginning. So glad to have all of you with me on the journey. Stay well and stay safe.

~*~ Thirteen ~*~

“Can you pass the trowel?”

Hermione shifted, reaching across the lab bench to hand Aurelia the tool. “Here. What next?”

The other girl shrugged, honey eyes studiously avoiding Hermione. “Plant it and wait. Professor Winesport said it should germinate before the end of class today and be ready to harvest next week.”

“I suppose it’ll give me a chance to finish my latest essay for Professor Dumbledore,” Hermione murmured, allowing Aurelia to complete the planting unassisted. It had been a week since the dance and while Malfoy had seemed more amiable, Aurelia was most certainly not.

For several minutes there was nothing but the scratch of Hermione’s quill on the parchment and the clank of the trowel on the clay pot, but then Aurelia abruptly dropped the tool, the clatter echoing across the greenhouse, and stared across the workbench at Hermione. “Is it true you’re sleeping with Tom?”

Hermione’s breath caught and then released as she met her housemate’s challenging glare. Since the epiphany that sex with Tom might be the closest she ever got to total escape from her past and her pain, they hadn’t bothered to quell their urges. He’d claimed her in the library amidst the stacks, behind tapestries in the halls, even in the Slytherin common room in the darkest hours of the morning. They’d been utterly shameless in their pursuit of pleasure, worried about nothing beyond the heights of ecstasy they could reach together. It was at once liberating and terrifying.

Aurelia scraped the pot across the wooden surface of the bench. “I deserve an answer, Gable.”

Hermione knew that the idea of propriety in the Wizarding world was always ahead of that in the Muggle world, but she wasn’t entirely sure how ready the 1940’s, in either world, were for what she and Tom were doing. But she’d already treated Aurelia, the only person beyond Dumbledore who’d welcomed her freely here, so poorly. There was no excuse to continue to lie to her, propriety be damned. Sighing, Hermione nodded. “Yes.”

The other girl blinked, momentarily stunned as she digested Hermione’s answer. Her lips twitched and her eyes alit, closer to the luminous honey of when they’d first been acquainted. “Is it any good? I heard from Hyacinth Parkinson that when she and Cygnus finally did the act, it was awful and she never wanted to see another man without his clothes again.”

Hermione couldn’t help the snort of laughter that escaped. “Merlin, that must have been truly awful. Although the first time isn’t always good. Actually, unless you have a partner that takes the time to… care for you, it can be bloody awful.” She paused, studying Aurelia. The girl’s hands were clenched on the edge of the workbench, her body tilted toward Hermione in undisguised interest. “Tom wasn’t my first time, Aurelia. Far from it actually. But he is by far the best I’ve ever had.”

“But never with Mallet?”

It took Hermione a moment to realize she was asking about Malfoy. Her stomach dropped upon the realization, a dread she couldn’t understand curdling its contents. “No. I didn’t lie to you before, Aurelia. Dacian and I are barely friends. We were thrown together by circumstance, not choice.”

“That may be, but I’m not blind. And neither is Tom. You can deny it all you want, but Dacian clearly feels something substantial for you. He’s protective in a way only a sibling or lover should be.” There was an apologetic smile on her thin lips, a knowledge that her words were not what Hermione wanted to believe. “I know you don’t want to hear this and I know the distance between us is my fault, but being naïve isn’t going to help you, Hermione.”

Hermione ran a hand through her hair, fingers snagging on stray curls. Sighing, she met Aurelia’s charged stare. “I know. I just don’t understand Dacian at all. I thought I knew where we stood, but the closer I get to Tom, the less I understand anything.”

Aurelia blinked once, slowly. “You’re falling for him. Truly falling for him.” She shook her head, mouth tugging down at the corners. “Oh, Hermione. He’s going to shatter you. How could you be so stupid?”

How could she, indeed. And yet every time he took her away from the pain, every time she downed in those dark sapphire eyes, every time he filled the ache that festered deep within, she slipped just a little bit further. She, better than anyone, knew how foolish it was to fall for the monster, to stake her life and the world’s future on a boy with madness in his veins. But without his touch, what was the point of it all anyway? Her world had already ended, her friends and family dead and gone, and this was only limbo, all greys and shadows of a life that had once been. Was it really such a crime to cling to him and all the hope he gave her battered soul? For with every high a sliver of her returned from the darkness, a fraction of the girl who’d believed the world should be saved.

Beside her, Aurelia sighed, the sound heavier than it ought to be. “But I get it. If anyone can handle Tom, it’s you.” Hermione nodded her appreciation, her throat still tight with raw emotion. A hint of a smirk worked the frown off her friend’s lips. “But you are going to have to tell everyone, and soon. The rumors are flying far too fast to keep this contained. Plus, I think Malfoy saw you two in the common room one morning.”

Hermione jerked, eyes wide, before she realized Aurelia meant Abraxas. Her Malfoy already knew exactly what she and Tom were doing. Of course, just because he’d already heard her—they’d been careful to use silencing spells after that—didn’t mean that she wanted him seeing her with Tom. Something about the possibility had bile rising in her throat.

Shaking her head, she focused on the important part of Aurelia’s observation. “I’ll be sure to mention it to Tom. Although I’m sure he’s aware of every single word anyone has said about him anywhere in the school.”

“Yes, he does have a way of being annoyingly omniscient,” was her dry reply.

Legilimency was the obvious explanation, but Hermione wasn’t about to alert anyone, not even Aurelia, to her full knowledge of Tom’s darker talents. Besides, he hadn’t directed an attack of that particular variety in her direction since they’d started this semblance of a relationship. She wanted to believe he would continue to respect her mind so long as they were together. A less naïve part of her mocked that hope, but Hermione was in the practice of ignoring large portions of her conscious and subconscious.

A sudden bustle in the rest of the greenhouse alerted both girls to the end of the class period. Aurelia picked up their Sneezewort and placed it on the counter with the rest. By the time she returned, Hermione had rolled her parchment into a neat tube and tied it with extra twine she kept in her schoolbag. Aurelia bounced on her toes for a long moment before a half smile cracked across her face.

“Walk me to Divination?”

Hermione couldn’t help her answering grin. “Absolutely.”

The delighted giggle that escaped her friend elicited an answering laugh. Feeling lighter, Hermione threaded her arm through Aurelia’s as they strode out of the greenhouse, laughter echoing off the castle walls. This, this she could do without even a hint of remorse or guilt.


	14. Fourteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope each and every one of you is well. I think the most important thing to remember right now is that we are brought together here, in this space, and that we are a community of support. Thank you for your support of me, but know that I also support you, in whatever small ways I can.
> 
> This chapter is the beginning of ACT II, of the the second movement, of a shift forward in our narrative. That comes with the following WARNINGS: public(ish) sex act, dubious consent. What happens here is addressed throughout the narrative and specifically in the next few chapters. Know that there is a purpose to every scene I write and that none of this is for shock and awe value. All these characters are a million shades of grey and this is only one example of that.
> 
> Okay, on that note, enjoy!

~*~ Fourteen ~*~

Snow evaporated into nothing above the Slytherin table in the Great Hall as they all dug into the latest winter delicacy from the kitchens. Hermione stabbed a piece of winter squash on a fork, letting it linger in her mouth, the melt of butter and spices reminding her of Christmases past with her parents. Realizing what she was doing, she swallowed, nearly choking in the process. She could feel the sudden moisture limning her eyes and blinked several times before anyone at the table could notice what was happening to her.

The sudden heat of Tom’s hand against her thigh was a welcome distraction from the precipice of memory. His fingers trailed circles of fire above her skirt before shifting closer to the hem. It took all of her control not to shake as his hand moved back up, now under the heavy fabric of her wool skirt. She’d opted for only knee-high socks that morning and was suddenly uncertain if that had been a wise decision. Tom wasn’t moving his hand any higher than her mid-thigh, but his fingers were doing wicked things to the bare skin there.

He bestowed a knowing smirk upon her before he shifted his attention to Malfoy, who was just entering the hall. “Mallet! Come sit with us.”

It wasn’t a question. Malfoy lifted a midnight brow as he slid into the vacant space across from them. “Riddle, Gable.”

He began absently filling his plate, clearly waiting for Tom to explain. In the nearly four months they’d been living here, Tom had never once invited Malfoy anywhere near his group or himself. Tom stayed silent, fingers inching higher up Hermione’s shirt until they were just brushing the cotton of her knickers. Her breathing hitched, but she managed to hide the abrupt reaction behind a sip of pumpkin juice.

His agile fingers continued to stoke teasingly across the apex of her thighs as he focused his gaze on Malfoy. “I’d like you to join my… club. Membership is quite exclusive and I believe it is past time that we add your skillset to our ranks.”

Malfoy froze, for a mere second, but long enough that both Hermione and Tom could see. Tom’s smirk deepened, cobalt eyes glinting dangerously as she stole a glance in her periphery. Malfoy scowled across from them, flint behind his stormy visage.

“And what exactly do you think I have to offer, Riddle?”

“You’ve been through a war, Mallet. I’ve seen what Gable here can do,” Tom, paused, dexterous fingers slipping beneath the final layer of separation. He smiled in satisfaction, either at Malfoy or at the sudden rush of wetness that greeted the bold gesture. It took all of Hermione’s control not to react, not to grind against those tantalizing digits. Tom flicked a finger across her before turning his attention back to Malfoy. “I want you because you possess the same skills she does. The rest of my members are children. I would appreciate another man, an equal, at least in skill.”

Hermione had given up the pretense of eating, hiding behind the glass of pumpkin juice. Thankfully both her robe and Tom’s obscured what he was doing to her and Malfoy’s attention was firmly on Tom, his frostbitten eyes barely blinking as he studied the man across from him. She knew she could stop Tom, could pull away, but she honestly didn’t want to. The rush of adrenaline at the risk, the forbidden nature of his fingers against her in such a public place, had her rooted to the spot, flesh trembling at his every caress.

“You’ve made clear what I might do for you,” Malfoy observed, “but what about what you will do for me?”

It was a very Slytherin question, one that reminded her this was not his first round in the serpents’ pit. Tom grinned like the Cheshire Cat. “Ah, now that is the question isn’t it? I’m not like that pathetic Slughorn who simply collects what he cannot have. The members of my group will go on to positions of power.”

Malfoy raised a doubtful brow. “And how can you guarantee such things? You do not come from a powerful family nor do you have any current connections to the Ministry that I am aware of.”

Tom laughed, dark and dangerous. “I like you, Mallet.” His hand rotated subtly between her thighs and then a digit pressed into her, her walls spasming subtly as it pumped slowly in and out, his palm pressing hard against the throbbing apex. She nearly dropped the pumpkin juice and Malfoy’s eyes briefly flew to her, a frown tugging at his full lips. Tom spoke before he could take too much of an interest in her flushed visage. “I may not have family connections, Mallet, but I have been building the infrastructure, the resources for my ascent in the Ministry, since I arrived at Hogwarts six years ago.” Tom’s focus flickered to the known members of his collective seated further down the table. “They are not all cut out for roles of power like you and I, Mallet, but they are useful in their own right. Believe me, you will have whatever you desire with me at your side.”

Malfoy’s eyes flickered to Hermione for barely a millisecond, but Tom caught the movement. “Except her. She is mine.” The statement was punctuated by a second finger joining the first, stretching her in deliciously, both crooked to give her maximum pleasure. Hermione wasn’t sure how much longer she could last, her thighs were trembling from the need for release, her teeth gritted against the orgasm that threatened to overwhelm her.

Thankfully Malfoy was back to glaring at Tom, his possessive statement clearly not sitting well. “This isn’t eighteen hundred, Riddle, she isn’t some bride to be bought and bartered for.”

“No,” Tom agreed. He made a sweeping gesture with his free hand and suddenly the entire Slytherin table was silent, their undivided attention on Tom. Hermione’s breath was caught in her throat as she continued to fight the wave of pleasure threatening to overwhelm her. Tom spoke with an authoritative voice, that although soft, carried the length of the table, his fingers never pausing their assault of her senses. “It has come to my attention that my relationship with Ms. Gable is the subject of several rumors. I would like to dispel them and give you the truth of the matter. Ms. Gable and I are, in fact, together and it is indeed serious.” He scanned the length of the table, dark eyes pausing on every face. “I have every intention of making her my wife before the year is out.”

The uproar was instantaneous, but Tom ignored them all, bringing his lips to her ear. “Now come for me, precious.”

She couldn’t fight it any longer, not with his fingers brushing the right spot over and over, his thumb flicking over her just so and his tongue teasing the lobe of her ear. She collapsed against him, wetness soaking her thighs, tongue metallic with blood as she bit back a scream of ecstasy. He grinned against her skin, his thumb flicking one last time, but now her control was gone and she was unable to stop her body from jolting with pleasure. Tom captured her moan with a hungry kiss before extracting both his lips and his hand. A flick of his wand and his fingers were clear of the evidence of her pleasure. He turned back to Malfoy who was now gaping at her, clearly understanding what had just happened in front of him.

“So, Mallet, what do you say?”

Whatever vulnerability had been in Malfoy’s stormy eyes was gone when he focused back on Tom. “I accept. I’d like to see what we can do together.”

“Wonderful,” Tom purred before turning back to his dinner. Hermione couldn’t bring herself to look at Malfoy again and looking at Tom made her squirm in her seat, heat still gathering in her core, so she stared down at the winter squash instead, trying to remember how to use her fork.


	15. Fifteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I continue to hope you are all doing well and staying safe. Thank you for the myriad of responses and outpouring of support. I am so gratified that so many of you are interested in this story, all bringing such unique perspectives. For those worried about Hermione's choices, I urge you to read carefully. Thank you again for all you do for me and other authors.

~*~ Fifteen ~*~

The stacks at the back of the library were overrun with books, leather bound manuscripts pouring out onto tables and chairs. It gave her a profound sense of calm to be surrounded by such organized chaos. A sense of calm she desperately needed. After Tom’s overt claiming of her during supper, she’d fled, unable to look anyone in the eye, lest she see a knowing smirk or derisive laugh. No, it was far better to hide from it all, to consider the magnitude of her stupidity alone with nonjudgmental books.

Her fingers trembled where they rested against the oak table; they hadn’t stopped shaking since she’d left the Great Hall. She hadn’t stopped shaking, overwhelmed by the sense that she was in far deeper than she’d known, that whatever path she’d charted was not the direction her ship had sailed. Groaning, she buried her head in her hands, forehead resting against the cool wood. She would not cry; she would not give in to the torrent of emotion that rattled in her bones. She would not be weak, not after so many years of facing far greater foes than a boy who would make her his.

A shoe scuffed against the floor behind, yet she didn’t move, utterly unwilling to face the intruder. There was a long silence and then a soft voice whispered, “May I sit?”

Her cheeks heated, but she didn’t refuse him. “Go ahead. Make the humiliation complete.”

Malfoy sighed, the chair across from her scraping as he settled into it. She would not think of the last time they’d sat across a table from each other.

“I have no interest in humiliating you.” His voice was soft, raw in a way she’d only heard a handful of times in the Room of Requirement.

“You could have fooled me.”

He scoffed and she could feel the weight of his stare upon her downturned head. “We’ve covered this already. I apologize for the boy I once was. That does not mean his interests and mine intersect in any way.”

Dragging a hand over her pounding temples, Hermione finally lifted her head to study him. His full lips were pulled into a severe frown, his tempestuous gaze full of an emotion just beyond her reach. She glanced sideways at the stacks around them before flicking her wand. “ _Muffliato_. Then why exactly did you say yes to Tom?”

Barren December skies blinked once, twice. “You think I’m signing up to be a Death Eater all over again.”

She hadn’t thought of it in quite those terms, but he’d correctly identified the tendril of horror that had been twining tighter and tighter about her aching heart. “Your enthusiasm seemed genuine.”

Malfoy’s angular features contorted, a pain she couldn’t understand rippling across his face. “I didn’t have a choice, Hermione. That wasn’t a request. Riddle doesn’t ask permission, he simply takes. I would think that was obvious to you tonight.”

The clear reference to her very public orgasm had her burying her face in her hands again. “I could have stopped him.”

The sharp laugh was enough to jerk her gaze upward again. He stared unrelentingly back at her. “Could you?”

“Yes,” she snapped, but doubt was creeping into her. Was Malfoy right? She’d not wanted him to stop, but neither had she wanted to participate in such a public sexual act. If given a choice, would she have opted not to allow such a trespass? Shaking her head, she glared back at Malfoy, all bravado and barely concealed tumult. “You still haven’t explained why you didn’t say no.”

“I thought I had.” But he sighed, shaking his head, lustrous midnight strands dropping in front of stormy eyes. “Perhaps I need to make certain truths more apparent to you. I accepted Riddle’s offer for two reasons. One, it was not actually a question, but a demand.” Her mouth opened in protest, but he held up a hand. “No. Of the two of us, I am far more familiar with Riddle’s leadership methods than you are. I also accepted because it may be the only way to keep you safe.”

A different sort of adrenaline pulsed through her veins. “What?”

Malfoy stared at her, a careful tenderness in his expression that shook her. “Believe it or not, I do not wish you any harm, Hermione Granger. In fact, I’ve been doing everything in my power to keep you safe from Riddle for the last few months. You haven’t made it easy and after his declaration today, I worry there will only be so much I can do to keep you from him. I can best serve both of us by accepting a place on the inside of his… organization.”

Although her mind told her to doubt his every word, the sincerity in his eyes was impossible to ignore. She focused instead on a part of his explanation that didn’t quite make sense. “After his declaration?”

Malfoy blinked, pale cheeks flushing as he swallowed. “Um, I’m not sure you were very coherent when he announced to all of Slytherin that he planned to marry you by year’s end. I assume he meant the school term in the spring and not New Year’s Eve as that’s only two weeks away.”

The memory came back in a rush, hazy at the edges with the stain of pleasure. Tom had tumbled her over the precipice mere moments after announcing something very like an engagement. She hadn’t had the wits to realize what he’d just done when she’d been quaking with need, but now it was disturbingly clear. They’d never discussed anything of the sort and she’d been under the impression that he was content hiding their relationship, not that he was planning to make it official in every way that mattered. She shook, knuckles white where they gripped the edge of the table. Using Tom for relief from the dark terrors of her mind, fine. Marrying Tom, absolutely not. But what if it was the only way to save him? To prevent the cascade of events that would ultimately destroy everything and everyone dear to her?

“You won’t marry him,” Malfoy said, soft and utterly sure. “I promise.”

“But—”

“No. There is always another way.” He rubbed a hand over a dark brow and she frowned, reminded again how different he was from the boy she’d despised. “I know you think you need him, that he’s your only escape from the hellscape we endured, but I need you to start considering different… remedies.”

“I don’t want to feel so connected to him, Malfoy,” she admitted. “But it’s like he’s taken up residence in my head, like he’s the drug I can’t resist.”

His sharp chin jerked upward, eyes frantically scanning her face. “Like he’s in your head?”

Hermione nodded, avoiding his discerning stare. “Yeah. There’s this sense of completion I get when I’m with him. I’ve tried everything… things I’m even less proud of than him. But I suppose you likely saw that when you were…” She couldn’t quite vocalize just how far into her psyche Malfoy had ventured. “The emptiness, it hurts so damn much, I do everything I can to escape it. I can’t help it.”

“But only sex has ever worked for you.” The words were barely audible, but barren of judgment.

She swallowed around the lump lodged deep in her throat. “After Ron and Ginny died, there was nothing left for me. Not even the thought of defeating Voldemort could sustain me. One night, Harry and I drank a little too much, the next thing I knew the ache was gone, if only for a few minutes. I’m not sure it had the same effect on him, but he never turned me away after that. So I just kept killing and fucking and praying it would all end.”

“When we came here, you simply continued what you’d been doing with Riddle. After all, he is more than willing to use you in kind.” Malfoy didn’t sound bitter exactly, but his tone wasn’t as free of emotion as it had been.

“Aurelia thinks I’m falling in love with him.”

“If only it were that simple.” A rueful smile graced his full lips for a mere second, there and gone. “I could protect you from a broken heart I think, but we both know that’s not what’s going on here.”

Hermione groaned, staring despondently across at him. “No. I can’t help it. The need to connect, to feel something beyond this never ending misery, to satisfy this ache that burns me from within, is too overwhelming to fight. And I’m tired of fighting, Malfoy.”

“And you’ve chosen the worst partner in crime available.”

“He’s bloody brilliant at sex.”

“You know that’s not what I meant,” Malfoy chastised. “He’s a controlling psychopath.”

Hermione growled, looking away from those stormy eyes that promised futures she could not begin to believe. “I’m not about to stop, you know. Tom makes me feel whole, honest to Merlin human. It’s not so bloody wrong to want that, is it?”

“Of course not.”

“So what if I have to marry him? All the better to make sure he doesn’t turn into a murderous lunatic.” That wasn’t remotely what she felt about the possibility of marrying Tom Riddle, but Draco bloody Malfoy didn’t have any right to know her like this.

“Hence my membership in his club.” He picked at the cover of a discarded book. “Despite what you seem to think, we are in this together.”

She glared at him, suddenly tired of him knowing every dirty facet of her soul and her knowing rubbish about him. “Don’t you ever want to escape? Don’t you ever hate everything? Don’t you wish you could forget?”

The book he’d been touching was flying across the alcove before Hermione realized he’d thrown it. “Of course, I bloody wish I couldn’t remember! It hurts so damn much that I think about walking off the top of the Astronomy Tower nearly every day. But I don’t have the luxury of burying my head in the sand like you. If I give up that means she died for nothing!”

He was shouting by the end, spittle spraying her face as he trembled above her. The usual frosty veneer of his eyes was gone, replaced by a hurricane of emotion that swept the breath from her lungs.

“I didn’t know.” She still didn’t know. She had no idea what had happened between that night he’d let the Death Eaters into the school and the day they’d been swept into the past. Taking a shaky breath, she realized she didn’t know him at all. “I didn’t know,” she repeated, syllables wavering and clumsy.

“No. You bloody don’t,” he agreed, a chill in his tone that hadn’t been there before. “And I’d thank you to stop making selfish assumptions. The world doesn’t bloody revolve around you, Hermione Granger.”

Without another word he was gone, the air shimmering as he burst outside of the protective sphere of the _muffliato_. Hermione collapsed back in her chair, suddenly weary. What had started with a humiliation one sort had morphed into one of an entirely different nature. What Tom had done to her with her threadbare permission seemed nothing compared to the dark rage behind Malfoy’s eyes. Whatever had happened to him, she was beginning to suspect it had indeed been worse, or at least more personal, than the scars of war left behind on her soul. And perhaps, perhaps he was truly more broken than Hermione. She rested her cheek against the wooden table, staring blankly at the tomes surrounding her, not moving for a very long time.


	16. Sixteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your continued support. I hope you are all well and wish you the very best as we navigate this mad world. Stay safe and stay well.

~*~ Sixteen ~*~

Aurelia was waiting for her when she finally dragged herself back to the dorms, long after curfew had passed. Her honey eyes were dark, filled with an emotion Hermione didn’t dare identify as she closed the door quietly behind her. Aurelia shifted on her bed, but didn’t rise, didn’t cross the distance between them. Hermione looked anywhere else, eyes already raw, tear tracks coating her numb cheeks. Her friend cleared her throat and Hermione focused on her shoes.

“That was quite the declaration at dinner.”

Her tone was impossible to interpret, each word lacking any inflection. Hermione swallowed, thick and coated with shame. “How much did you see?”

“Almost nothing. If it hadn’t been for Dacian’s expression, I never would have realized what had happened. But then Tom moved his hand and it was all too clear. I don’t think anyone else noticed. Everyone was looking at Tom, not Dacian.” The bed clothes rustled, but still Hermione would not look up. “Did you want that, Hermione?”

She wanted to say no. She wanted to say yes. She wanted to know what had happened. “I don’t know.”

“Tom takes what he wants, Hermione. He’s never wanted a girl before, at least not here, but that doesn’t mean he won’t treat you like anything else he wants. You have to stand up to him if this isn’t the path you want to walk. You have to stop him before you can’t, before he’s taken everything that matters.” Aurelia’s voice was soft, but her words were sharp now, barbed with truth.

Malfoy had told her to stop, and now Aurelia was, so why couldn’t she? Why couldn’t she imagine a world without Tom by her side? Why did he matter so very much to her? It made so little sense and yet it was deep inside of her, impossible to deny.

“I like how he makes me feel.”

“Used?”

“Fulfilled, human.”

“What happened to you?” The question was asked with kindness, her voice gentle in a way Hermione had forgotten existed. It wasn’t a demand, had no expectation of a response. No, it merely crossed the distance between them, told her she was not so very alone.

“War happened. A war without end. A war which stole my soul and left me with nothing but a shadow for a heart.” A truth perhaps only Malfoy truly understood. She refused to think of him, of the frostbitten anger in his eyes as he’d fled the library. “Tom is the only person who’s made me feel even remotely human again.”

“Oh, Hermione.” Aurelia was at her side in an instant, small arms enfolding her in a hug that felt twice the size. “I didn’t know.”

“We thought it best not share.”

The slighter girl’s arms tightened, clasping Hermione more firmly against her warmth. “We? You mean Dacian. I thought you had spent time together in hiding, avoiding the war. But you weren’t hiding, you were fighting.” She pulled back slightly, enough for her warm eyes to fasten on Hermione’s tear streaked face. “You both fought.”

Hermione nodded, Aurelia’s amber locks sticking to her chapped lips. She swallowed, once, then twice, before admitting, “for different sides.”

The other girl went stiff, eyes blown wide. “Oh…. Oh, Merlin. No wonder you kept insisting there could be nothing between you.”

“Please don’t tell anyone. We’re… not on such different sides now.” Aurelia nodded fervently, closing the gap between them once more. Hermione’s arms slowly came up to settle about her friend’s shoulders. It had been so long since she’d simply been touched, without any intention beyond human comfort. It made her breath catch, the tears breaking free once more.

Within seconds she was clinging to Aurelia, her face buried her hair, her fingers trembling against her slight shoulders. “Please don’t judge me… please,” she hiccupped between sobbing breaths. “Please…”

The other girl’s hands tangled in her hair in soothing sweeps that reminded Hermione painfully of her mother’s slender hands after she’d woken from a nightmare, years before she knew magic existed, before she’d ever entered the world that would destroy her. “I forgive you, Hermione. Whatever it is, I forgive you. If you need Tom, then you need him. I promise I’ll look out for you if you can’t do it yourself.” She pressed her lips against Hermione’s cheek. “You don’t have to be strong for me, not tonight.”

Hermione shook, unable to contain the torrent of emotion that rushed out of her, Aurelia’s words breaking every dam and levee she possessed. Years had passed since she’d been safe enough to let go, to do more than merely forget. It hurt more than she remembered, like a million knives slicing through every facet of her marrow, but it was also a relief. She’d been holding on so tightly, forcing herself forward despite the lead coating her soul, that to stop, if only for a moment, was a gift of incomparable value. So she let it all rip through, let the horror of Harry’s death fully coalesce for the first time, let the terror of having only a Death Eater as a confidant rattle her bones, let the unhealthy and shameful truth of her relationship with Tom fall from her lips as unhinged sobs. Aurelia never wavered, holding Hermione with all the strength her petite frame could muster as the hours passed and the horrors came in waves. Near dawn they drifted off atop the coverlet of Aurelia’s bed, their hands twined together and Hermione’s breathing even, momentarily free from torment.


	17. Seventeen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I appreciate all of you. Stay safe and well. And now for some Christmas in June...

~*~ Seventeen ~*~

The sun hung low in the sky, nearly kissing the dull horizon, as Hermione peered over the turrets of the Astronomy Tower. A cold wind whipped her thick hair across her face despite the scarf knotted tightly about her neck, the icy tendrils of winter stinging her chilled skin. It was Christmas. It was Christmas and she couldn’t muster even the slightest hint of merriment to mark the occasion.

The past week had been a hell in its own right with only Tom and Malfoy for company in the drafty castle. She and Malfoy hadn’t spoken beyond the necessary since he’d stormed out of the library and she hadn’t had the courage to question Tom about his intention to marry her. Some childish part of her hoped that if she didn’t mention it, he’d forget about the vow entirely and she’d be spared the trouble of dealing with it and its vast implications. Of course, Hermione wasn’t some naïve girl anymore and she knew her reckoning would come. But not today.

She watched the two cloaked figures circle the lake below, two midnight heads bowed in quiet conversation. Tom had been true to his word and she’d seen Malfoy disappear into the latest meeting of Tom’s followers before the term had adjourned. Now they spent most waking hours together, talking in hushed tones that cut off whenever she entered the room. If not for Malfoy’s vehement outburst she would have worried he was falling into the web Tom had laid. But no, whatever Tom might be constructing, Malfoy was keenly aware of what he was doing, his mind an impenetrable vault to all.

The figures paused at the far edge of the lake and a moment later spells began to fly between them. A practice duel, and not their first. While Tom had never asked Hermione for a repeat of their DADA demonstration, he’d had Malfoy squaring off against him the first chance they got. Hermione watched idly as the spells clashed and sparked across the snow, gaining intensity as the fight continued. Soon there were more dark incantations than normal dueling spells, the content entirely found in the Restricted Section. Neither man wavered under the increased potency of the attacks. Then there was the distinctive crack of the Cruciatus Curse hitting the slighter figure, grazing his shoulder and dropping him to his knees. Hermione nearly collapsed herself, only an arm around the parapet keeping her upright. The sound of chilling laughter, disembodied and razor sharp, floated up to the tower before the kneeling figure waved his wand, violent and merciless. In an instant the other figure was spayed before him, ebony curls a dark halo on the pristine snow.

Hermione wasn’t sure which curse Malfoy had used to level Tom in such a dramatic fashion, but she couldn’t help the sigh of relief when both clasped hands, pulling each other upright again. It wasn’t the first time Tom had used the Cruciatus on Malfoy, but it was the first that Malfoy had so effectively shrugged off its effects. Sighing, she turned away from them, letting her back slide down the rough stone until she was sitting on the frozen ground.

She knew Malfoy was right; Tom was as dangerous as he’d ever been. He used the torture curse without hesitation or remorse. He used those around him just as Voldemort would do. And yet, he was still not the monster of her nightmares, the man without a soul or face. No, he was still the boy whose eyes turned liquid as he hovered over her, whose skin called to hers with an infinite siren song. He was still human. Broken perhaps, but not beyond repair. So she held onto the hope that grew when they tumbled into the throes of pleasure, held on with every broken fragment of her soul because that was all she had left, a desperate hope that a monster could become a man.

The wind was sharper when awareness dawned on her again, the sun half eaten by the snowy hills. Her skin was chilled despite the layers she wore, her breath a frozen pant of fog. She wasn’t surprised she didn’t remember choosing to stay atop the tower. Despite the hours of bliss she found in Tom’s embrace, time still had a habit of slipping away just as her dreams were still drenched in blood and terror. The night spent sobbing into Aurelia’s soft embrace had done nothing to quell the darkness tarnishing her soul. It had given her a momentary respite, a chance to grieve Harry properly, but no fundamental shift in the misery beneath her skin. The continued loss of time wasn’t something she could be used to, but she was. Perhaps the old Hermione would have dug and dug into her psyche until she could find a cause and then a solution. But she didn’t have the energy to search or the will to face what lay within.

Her joints were stiff as she pulled herself unsteadily up, her feet numb and unprepared for the full force of her weight. She bobbled, swaying dangerously far over the parapets before finally steadying. Her toes began to tingle, then sting as she limped down the spiral stair, pausing to check her unsteady gait as necessary. At the bottom, she held a hand against the rough wall as she slowly made her way back to the Slytherin common room. She didn’t pause there, the room deserted anyway, instead climbing to the prefects’ bathroom. Her limbs were still mostly frozen and a long soak in the tub there seemed like just the thing to chase away the chill and protect her from either Malfoy or Tom.

She tumbled through the open door before realizing she hadn’t needed the password. A frantic glance around the room had her focus shifting to Malfoy, covered only by a towel and staring at her with wide, tumultuous eyes. She drank in every drop of his damp skin before she could think better of it. His muscles were less severe than Tom’s, but no less defined, his skin a pale alabaster that seemed delicate despite the strength within. One of his legs was propped up on a ledge, highlighting his sculpted calf and muscled thigh. But that wasn’t what stole Hermione’s breath away, leaving her unmoored and scrambling for comprehension. No, that would be the angry, inky veins stretching over his thigh like a network of grizzly spider webs. His leg was off the ledge in an instant, safely covered by the towel, but the image was burned into her lids, impossible to ignore. She stumbled back, crashing into one of the sinks near the door.

“That’s…” But words wouldn’t come for her, only a dawning comprehension that threatened to further fracture her already battered soul.

He frowned at her, all sharp angles and flashing eyes. “A bloody curse. Yes, I’m perfectly aware, Granger.”

The angry tendrils flashed across her vision. “Not just any curse.”

“No,” he agreed, bitter and yet utterly calm.

She slowly closed the gap between them, moving carefully as if the slightest twitch might startle him. Malfoy watched her come, didn’t move from his spot beside the great bath. Finally, she was close enough to touch him, but she didn’t. It didn’t matter that his skin was as smooth as porcelain or that his muscles stretched the panes of his chest and abdomen in all the right ways. It didn’t matter that he was breathtakingly handsome with those dark brows and midnight fringe tracing his collar bone. None of that mattered one lick in comparison to the evil tattooed beneath his pale skin. She’d seen a curse like it only once before. The victim had been driven mad within weeks, taking her own life before the Order could find a way to mitigate the pain.

Her mouth was dry. Malfoy hadn’t been kidding about walking off the Astronomy Tower the other night in the library. To live with such… suffering. It was nearly incomprehensible. “When?”

“Two years ago.”

“How?”

He peered down at her, lips twisting in a ghost of a sneer. “How do you expect? The bloody snake couldn’t get his puppet to dance exactly as he’d like.”

She’d known it had to have been Voldemort, but the confirmation felt like a bevy of bricks poured over her head. “Why?”

“None of your bloody business.” Now the sneer was in full bloom, twisting his handsome features into a darker, more sinister countenance. “We’re not friends, remember? Not even friendly. You don’t want my help and I’m certainly not going to accept your pity. Now get out.”

“I’m sorry, Malfoy. I’m sorry I’ve misjudged you so much.” She was sorry. Sorry in ways that made her ache, in ways that told her she’d been ignorant, living in a bubble of her own misery for far too long. It was clear Hermione was far from having the monopoly on suffering.

“Get out,” he repeated. “And don’t you dare breathe a word of this to your sadistic boyfriend.”

The jab hit like a dagger through the heart, all hot burn and sudden truth. This Riddle may not have done more than throw a Cruciatus Curse Malfoy’s way, but he was still the source of Malfoy’s suffering, of the pain she knew did not fade, no matter what remedy the healers concocted. She backed out the door, tripping over the doorjamb in her blind haste. Malfoy’s eyes were hurricanes of cold rage as they tracked her retreat, burned into her memory just as surely as the labyrinth of darkness etched upon his thigh.

She collapsed on her bed some minutes later, strength sapped and soul flayed open once more. Merry Bloody Christmas indeed.


	18. Eighteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all. I wanted to take the time to mention why I've given Draco a curse that can't be helped and can't be healed. I've been wanting to incorporate chronic pain into a story for some time and this seemed a good opportunity. It fits with the magnitude of suffering his character has endured (more to come on that in later chapters) and it allows me to share my experiences with pain. I have a chronic, incurable illness that in a lot of ways seems to me like a curse. I didn't do anything wrong to get it. There was no accident. My body just slowly, but surely started failing me. Much like Draco, I am perfectly healthy on paper. What I have won't kill me, but at this point in modern medicine, there is no treatment beyond diet modification and a handful of medications. I have tried them all and none work except diet. So I have good days and bad days. I don't know what tomorrow will hold, but I know it's likely I'll be in pain. But will it be low enough to ignore and live or will it be so much I wish I could be anywhere else, anyone else? It's a struggle with the fear of the pain and the acceptance of it. But if I don't accept it, then it rules my life and that's no good either. Anyway, likely more than you ever wanted to know about me. But when Draco talks about pain in this story, he speaks for me.
> 
> Warnings: Sexual content.

~*~ Eighteen ~*~

Weeks passed, the bite of winter lingering in the stones of the castle walls. The rest of her housemates returned and Malfoy disappeared with Tom and his disciples often, the boys melting into darkness and not reappearing for hours on end. Hermione wasn’t even curious about what twisted activities they might engage in when no one was looking. She’d seen enough of the duels between Tom and Malfoy over the holiday to know it was nothing good—all dark magic and pain. She knew Malfoy could hold his own, perhaps better than anyone she’d ever known, and to worry about Tom would be pointless. The entire charade was his construction and none of the other boys would dare move against their charismatic leader, not when they knew the depths of agony he could incur should they step out of line.

She supposed she was no longer in denial about that, at least. Tom may have only killed Myrtle accidently, but he was hardly innocent. The spells he commanded, the ruthless abandon he’d shown while unleashing them upon Malfoy; she knew he was rotten, charming smiles hiding deadly power. Somewhere, deep within the tatters of her soul, she’d begun to suspect he was beyond redemption. But while she might acknowledge the dangerous power that hung like a shroud about him, she couldn’t bring herself to quit him. She’d been right when she’d labeled it as a drug, a need so deep and beyond reason. The way he made her feel, the ecstasy that erased the agony, was impossible to let slip away.

So she stayed with him, let his hands roam her curves at all the wrong times and lost herself in the feel of him filling her, hijacking her every sense until there was nothing left. Which is why she didn’t flinch away as Tom’s hand brushed just above the waistband of her skirt, fingers trailing fiery lust, his eyes locked on Malfoy’s over a game of wizarding chess. She didn’t look at the man seated across from them; he’d seen this before. Tom tended to be possessive with the other Slytherins, but it was only with Malfoy that he touched her so deliberately.

The game continued and so did his caresses. Hermione let her head fall back against Tom’s shoulder, hazy stare directed at the fireplace beyond the chess board. She could feel Tom’s burgeoning desire as he shifted her in his lap, subtly grinding her down on him. She swallowed, yearning for the promise that gesture held. Aside from that night in the Great Hall, he hadn’t pushed too far in public, hadn’t even reached beyond the protective layers of her clothing. Instead he trailed innocent, but tantalizing caresses across what skin was exposed, teasing until she was squirming with heady desire. She’d learned to go with it, that the sex afterward was well worth the minutes of teasing and the discomfort of such public, possessive touches. Malfoy never actually watched anyway, his focus steadfastly on Tom or whatever game lay between them. Perhaps that’s why Tom persisted, intent on at last drawing a reaction from his stoic companion.

She relaxed into Tom, melting into the languid stroke of his hand against her feverish skin. They hadn’t talked about the night in the great hall, and Tom had given no indication of his plans for them. But neither had he walked back his words. The whole of Slytherin now gave her almost as wide a berth as their king, a tacit acknowledgement of her advancement through their ranks. If her position bothered some of the more ambitious boys, Tom was… persuasive enough for them to hold their tongues. It was odd to suddenly be alone, even her time with Malfoy and Aurelia restricted by the altered perception. She belonged with Tom and all of Slytherin was there to remind her. She shook her head, catching a glimpse of stormy eyes boring through her. She held Malfoy’s charged stare for only a second before letting her lids slip shut, her head settling against Tom’s firm shoulder, ebony curls silken against her cheek as she inhaled the comforting scent of cloves. She was so very tired and at least Tom never judged her decisions.

The game was over. She frowned, not remembering it, not remembering what conversation had passed between them, barely able to sense anything but the pleasure simmering beneath the surface of her skin. She was lifted to her feet and then she was following Tom, letting him lead her to the prefects’ bath.

He swung her toward one of the sinks, leading her hands to grip the porcelain edges, the chill chasing up her arms. His lips were hot against her neck as his hands hiked her skirt, all propriety long forgotten now that they were alone. He nudged her legs gently apart, a hand stroking down her spine in a gesture that had her trembling. His lithe fingers dug into her hips to a moment before skating beneath her knickers. Hermione moaned, head falling back against his broad chest. She caught his eyes in the mirror, dark and languorous as they bored into her. Her breath caught in her chest, the magnitude of his stare supplanting even the tantalizing brush of his fingers. He was usually so controlled, even when they surrendered to their passion, but now he was raw, emotion drowning his sapphire eyes. She tumbled over the edge before she realized she was on the brink, the sight of him so unfettered too much.

She could feel the rattle of Tom’s chest and the frantic beat of his heart as he withdrew his hand. Luminous eyes locked with hers, he shifted, the clank of his belt hitting the floor echoing in the empty bath. Hermione trembled as he sank into her, her hips pushing against the cool edge of the porcelain. He pulled her tenderly back against him, removing the pressure of the sink. Only once she was steady did he continue, a claiming thrust that had her keening and pushing back against him.

“Merlin, Hermione,” he moaned, voice dulcet velvet. A hand snaked through her hair, softly tugging her head back to stare at the mirror. “Now I want you to watch me. Can you do that for me, precious? Not a single blink until I’m coming inside you.”

The pleasure was at a fever pitch already and his words simply set her further aflame. She stared into those liquid sapphire eyes as everything else evaporated into a haze of ecstasy and spiced clove. Time was gone again, but this time at Tom’s behest, and she welcomed the blur which held nothing but carnal satisfaction and swirls of sapphire.

Sometime later awareness crashed back into her. The chill of the ledge by the bath through her disheveled skirt, the crusting drip of spent pleasure against her thighs, the realization that she was utterly alone in the bath. She was seated at the edge of the giant tub, the taps turned to hot, but Tom was gone. She turned the water off, frowning. Her breathing was oddly labored as she moved to clean the mess between her legs with her wand before drenching her face in violently cold water from the sink. She felt exhausted, as if she’d just taken all her OWLs and NEWTs in the same day. Shaking the water from her face, she moved carefully toward the door, mindful that certain parts of her anatomy were decidedly sore. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it told her just how much she didn’t remember.

The hall was clear outside the bath and she took a tentative step forward, praying to Merlin and Godric and whoever else might listen, that she could make it back to her room unnoticed. Her luck ran out almost immediately as a hand shot out from the nearest doorway and she was propelled into the adjacent room.

Hermione stumbled, her legs still wobbly, nearly collapsing on the bed. Malfoy stood across the room, eyes dark and chaotic in the dim light of his room. His lips curled as he took full stock of her appearance, of the scents she was sure still clung to her skin. He closed the door with a flick of his wand and then recited several complex locking and silencing incantations. When the last of the spells settled into the wood of the door, he turned back to her, dark tempests behind frozen eyes.

“I can’t do this anymore, Granger.”

She frowned at him, unable to read anything beyond his clear distain. “Do what?”

“Watch you throw it all away.” A hand raked through the midnight strands that now rakishly kissed the slope of his shoulders. “You came here with a purpose, a way to prevent everything and now you’re… nothing but a bloody whore.”

The insult slid into her like a blade between the ribs. But she was used to such abuse from him, was perhaps even glad of the reminder of just how barbed his tongue could be. She pursed her lips together, ignoring the slight as she replied, “If I recall correctly you weren’t interested in my mission at all. You thought killing him was a fool’s errand and you wanted nothing to do with it.”

“I didn’t,” he admitted. “I didn’t want to be stuck in yet another universe where Voldemort ruined bloody everything. But we’re not where we were in September, are we? I’ve tried to support you, to figure this out with you, but it isn’t working. The situation has gotten out of hand and you bloody well know it. You reek of him and stale sex, Granger. It’s disgusting.”

Her teeth ground. “I could stop.”

“No,” he shook his head, a hint of emotion crossing his angled features. “No, I’m not sure you could. This is how you cope.”

If he’d said the words with any amount of anger or spite, she might have been able to argue. But Malfoy didn’t. He stated them as fact, devoid of any judgement or inflection. Tremors cascaded down her spine, her skin suddenly too hot. Her tongue was thick in her mouth, nearly incapable of forming her next words. “I lose time.”

He blinked down at her from his post across the room. “Time?”

“It started during the war, after Ginny died, but before we lost Ron. It was just a moment or two, then it became a few minutes…” She sighed, collapsing onto Malfoy’s bed, strength sapped and inadequacies laid bare.

He took a slow step forward, as if she might startle like cornered prey. He needn’t have worried; she hardly had the energy to meet his weighty stare. “How long now?”

“Hours.”

It was horrible. It was the truth. The truth she had never told Harry, the truth Tom knew only the barest hint of. The truth she had not admitted to herself until it had happened mid-battle and she’d nearly died in a pool of Neville Longbottom’s blood. She assumed only her deathlike appearance had prevented her from joining him that rainy spring day.

“Do you remember what you did afterward?” It was a bizarrely practical question, but that was Malfoy, all hard edges and cold pragmatism.

“No.”

She could see the tension in his jaw, the flash of danger behind those stormy eyes. “You mean to tell me, not only have you been letting Tom Riddle shag the life out of you, but you have also been doing so while not being fully conscious of your actions, without having full memory of your actions?”

It sounded a lot worse when he said it aloud, with all the pieces properly connected. Her throat was dry, syllables catching on each other as she sputtered, “I… I would know. I would remember—”

“No, you wouldn’t. That’s the whole bloody point of what you just told me.” He gripped his temples, slender fingers digging into alabaster flesh. “What was the point of teaching you Occlumency if you weren’t going to be aware for half the time you spent with him anyway? Why didn’t you say something?” Now the chill of his stare was melting into burning accusation. “Despite what you seem to think, you are not in this alone. I keep bloody telling you this. I may not like you most of the time, Granger, but I’m bloody here for you. I deserve to know something like this. I deserve to know that Tom sodding Riddle likely knows everything about me thanks to your bloody blackouts.”

“I don’t know anything about you.” Hermione knew that was hardly the point, but she wasn’t wrong. She knew about rumors, about whispers of death and pain and his curse, but little else.

His full lips slipped into a mockery of a smile. “Yes. But I suppose this explains why he’s so bloody intent on making me into the torture aficionado of his rag-tag death squad. Thank you, Granger. I truly live to inflict pain.” Malfoy spat the last statement, pure venom dripping from every word.

Hermione did her best not to cower, not to flinch as he stalked closer, suddenly kneeling before her. It could have been a submissive gesture, but there was nothing but ire in the taut lines of his lithe frame, in the hard sneer of his lips. “Oh, Hermione. You stupid, useless moron. You came here to kill the man, but now you’ve given him a glimpse of all his mistakes. Now you have created a monster far more insidious than the one we fled. And it is all your fault.”

“You don’t know he’s seen everything or even anything.” She ignored the rage, the just condemnation.

“No,” Malfoy admitted, “but I find it best to overestimate rather than underestimate my enemies.”

“I can change him.” They were desperate words, born of a hope she no longer could justify.

His smile was all bitter rancor. “You already have.” When all she did was blink at him, Malfoy continued, each word coated in acid. “You made him fall in bloody love with you, or the closest thing a deranged boy like him gets to love. Whatever we knew about him, it’s different now. He’s not letting you or your secrets go. Think of what he did to his most prized possessions. Now think of what he will do with you.” He shifted closer, breath hot against her cheek, midnight strands grazing her skin. “What he already does with you. Why do you think he’s all over you in front of me, Granger?”

She chewed her lip for a long moment. Malfoy withdrew only enough to capture her stare, daring her to answer him. She swallowed numbly, genuinely unsure. “He’s looking for a reaction? You never seem to react to anything he does… so he’s trying to push your buttons.”

“Perhaps, but why go through the bother of making me watch him with you like that? There are plenty of other ways he could get to me, especially during the meetings of his circle, but he never treats me any different than the rest of those sorry sods.”

Her heart skipped a beat, then another. She blinked, shaking her head, but unable to think of another logical conclusion. Swallowing heavily, she replied, “Tom thinks you want me and he’s proving that you can’t have me, that I belong to him. Just like the bloody locket and anything else he… desires. He always seemed to think you and I were involved, but he knows we never were, especially if he’s seen inside my head.”

Malfoy’s expression was inscrutable as he stared back at her, his breath ghosting across her lips. “Exactly.”

“But why does he think that? He can’t be right.” His unfathomable eyes continued to gaze though her every defense. Her voice was barely a whisper now. “Can he? He’s just being paranoid. You hate me.”

His tongue trailed lazily across his lips as he shifted into her space, his silken skin dragging across her cheek on the way to her ear. His voice was hard, edges and wrath and bitter truth. “I don’t have to like you to find you attractive, Granger. But unlike you, I do have some self-restraint when it comes to my dick.”

His confession, if it could be called that, left a metallic taste in her mouth. She flung herself away from him, sliding back on the bed. He let her go, eyes dark, at once devoid of and suffused with emotion.

Malfoy’s lips twisted. “Oh, no need to run. I’m not blind. I saw how you looked at me the minute we washed the dye out. It wasn’t like a woman should look at the man who supposedly tortured so many of her friends to death. It was like a wanton hussy.”

Hermione growled, low and primal. “I hate you.”

“Good. At least you remember that about me. A pity you didn’t remember that about Riddle before you let him spread your legs.” His grin was cruel as he stood, looming over the bed.

She was tired, tired of Tom and his nefarious agenda and now tired of Malfoy and his unprovoked attack on her character. She closed a fist around his pillow—the first object she could find—and flung it at him. The green clad object thwacked him in the head. She smiled in grim pleasure at the expression of shock that crossed his severe features.

“I’m done listening to you berate me like I’m some sort of child,” Hermione hissed. “I admit I have made mistakes, Malfoy. Not telling you about my lost time is probably the worst of them. But you’re giving me whiplash. One moment you’re the most understanding person I’ve ever met, infinitely patient, helping me figure out how to protect myself, checking that I’m okay. But then I wait five minutes and you’re in my face, pointing out every flaw I have. Taunting me with knowledge given to you in confidence. Bloody decide whose side you’re on, Malfoy, because I’m done playing this game.”

He stared silently back at her, barely blinking. She could hear the throb of her pulse at her temples, feel the uneven rise of her chest as her anger abated. Still he was silent, indecipherable storm clouds within wide eyes. Hermione shifted, drawing closer to the edge of the bed. It was only when her hand grazed the side of his chest, there and gone, that he moved. He sank to the floor beside the bed, head rocking back onto the mattress, hair a midnight halo against the emerald sheets. Malfoy’s lips moved silently for several long moments before he finally cut into the heavy silence.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. Any of it. And I know there’s no excuse for saying what I did, but I hate what he’s doing to you. I hate that you let him do it. That you beg him to do it. That no matter what I say, you go back to him. I want to figure this out with the girl who punched me in the face, not…”

He trailed off and it didn’t take any stretch of her imagination to know what he might have said. His previous taunts still lanced through her, their cruelty impossible to forget, but she could understand they were born of frustration, not ire. For whatever reason, Draco Malfoy truly did not seem to harbor any ill will toward her. She couldn’t forgive him the outburst that had reminded her all too well of the pale boy she’d known, but she wouldn’t dwell on it either.

“I hate that I want him to do it too. I hate that the only thing I’ve ever found to make the ache subside is lust.” Her fingers ran through his dark locks, spreading them further across the sheet. “Not even love. For me, sex has never been about love, at least, not since Ron died. I don’t even remember how it felt to sleep with him. Godric, I don’t even remember how it felt to kiss him.”

“It should be.” His throat bobbed as he spoke, eyes tracing lost patterns across the ceiling. “About love, that is. Lust doesn’t hold a candle to love.”

She frowned, wondering just what memories hid behind that troubled visage. She continued to weave her hand absently through his hair. “But love is only pain. Everyone I have ever loved was stolen from me, Malfoy.”

“Life is pain.” Her focus drifted to the leg held stiffly away from his body, the other easily folded to his chest. “You can’t hide from pain, Hermione. You don’t need to embrace it or celebrate it, but you have to accept it, to not let it or fear of it rule your life.”

“I’m not as strong as you are,” she whispered, hand tightening in his hair. “I can’t let myself feel it. I have to forget it.”

“You are stronger than you think, but there are less destructive ways of forgetting than allowing a madman to ravish you.” The statement held none of the heat of his earlier condemnations, but all of the truth.

“I wish I’d chosen you.” To confide in. To sate her lust. To trust.

He stilled her hand, drawing it away from his hair. “I would have turned you down and you would have found your way into his arms anyway. Regardless, the reality we face cannot be changed. A maniac, who likely has sensitive information about his own future, is in love with you and you are incapable of doing anything but yielding to his every desire.”

Hermione groaned, eyes squeezing shut. “You told me this was going to happen.”

“I’m not particularly interested in gloating about this one,” was his wry reply.

“Merlin, I’m in way too deep, aren’t I?”

“No, Hermione, we. We are in too deep.”


	19. Nineteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your kind words and continued support. To those of you who reached out on a personal level, I want you to know how much in the depths of suffering, your words can make the sun shine. So thank you. You've made my life better and that is no small thing.
> 
> I hope it is becoming clear what's happening to our dear heroine. This one's a bit shorter, but no less important. We're close to the breaking point... oh so close.

~*~ Nineteen ~*~

The dull haze of winter dug deep into her bones as the days started to blur together. Where time had been fluid before, if not exactly linear, it was now a discordant jumble that escaped Hermione entirely. In her more lucid moments—in classes and occasionally at night when she stayed in her dorm with Aurelia—she understood something was very, very wrong with her. Whatever side effects the war had wrought upon her had never been so severe, not even during the darkest of her days when the Order ranks were disintegrating like sandcastles at high tide. No, deep down, she knew her mind was broken, shifted into something foreign, untrustworthy. But then the feeling would fade and she’d drown in those hypnotic sapphire eyes and the world would be right again. It was exhausting.

Between the twisted vines of consciousness, she’d started to hear things, whispers, dark truths that hardly seemed possible. There were tales of screams in the classrooms in the dead of night, of unmistakable green lights seen in the depths of the Forbidden Forest. One Slytherin fourth year claimed she’d seen Cygnus Black making a stag dance for him by the light of the full moon. A Ravenclaw replied that he’d seen the Malfoy heir turn his wand on a fifth year until the boy had begged for mercy. No one said Unforgiveable, but it was implied and every story made Hermione ache, her mind rebel a fraction harder against the haze encircling it.

The unease gave her enough clarity to properly feel a jolt of alarm when Malfoy—her Malfoy, not his obnoxious grandfather—slid a parchment paper across her desk at the end of Transfiguration. Dumbledore narrowed his eyes at the exchange from his place at the front of the room, half-moon glasses shielding his eyes from her. Hermione didn’t pay the professor any heed; he was no longer her ally, even if she couldn’t quite remember why. The paper Malfoy had given her burned into her fingers, forbidden and suddenly important beyond measure. There were only three sentences:

_Ask Aurelia to help you get a new dress in Hogsmeade. I’m sure you’ll be needing one. Know that you haven’t been forgotten._

None of it made any sense. Why wouldn’t he just talk to her? She blinked, then tried to recall the last time she’d heard his voice. Hermione’s lips pulled down as dread pooled in her stomach. She couldn’t remember. She knew they’d spoken, fought really, fairly often, but now she couldn’t remember the sound of his voice, let alone the last time they’d spoken. It was all a white haze, present, but utterly indecipherable. A chill seeped down her spine, crawling through her veins to penetrate every limb. She glanced back at the note. She’d keep it until she told Aurelia, then she’d destroy it.

The note rubbed against the skin of her ankle for the rest of the day, stuffed into her sock for safe keeping. It was only after dinner and a heated snogging session with Tom in the Slytherin common room that Hermione returned to her dorm and finally removed the parchment. Tom was off to one of his now nightly meetings and Aurelia was chewing on a quill, honey eyes fastened on a textbook spread across her bed.

Hermione slid the note over her book. “What do you make of this?”

Aurelia barely glanced at the note. “I think it means Dacian has noticed that Tom’s a possessive git.”

“You knew about this.” Hermione wasn’t sure what ‘this’ was, but it was clear Aurelia knew Malfoy would be giving her the note. Her thoughts were messy again. She groaned, rubbing a hand across her temples.

Aurelia looked up, eyes narrowed as they swept over every facet of Hermione’s face. “Yes. And it’s best if you just join me for a nice outing at Madam Mayberry’s. You could use a new dress for your upcoming Valentine’s Day celebration with your fiancé next week.”

Hermione’s breath caught. Fiancé? She knew her relationship with Tom was serious, but she wasn’t expecting a ring. Or was she? Had they talked about it? She had a vague sense of a public proclamation on his part, but nothing clear, no true memory of any conversation. No voices, no words, only incomplete sensations, the hint of something and nothing all at once. Her skin prickled and then the thought was gone.

“Yes, a nice dress would be good.” She smiled at Aurelia. Her housemate was so thoughtful. “Thank you, Aurelia.”

Aurelia took a piece of parchment off the top of her textbook, sliding it beneath the tome. Hermione blinked then turned away. She was so very tired and her bed was all too inviting.

“Goodnight, Hermione.”

The other girl’s voice was sad, weary in way Hermione couldn’t understand. She threw a sunny smile over her shoulder. “You too, Aurelia.”


	20. Twenty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You are all so appreciated. Thank you for sharing this journey with me. We have finally reached the moment where the curtain is drawn back and the strings are exposed. But just because the problem is identified doesn't mean a solution exists. 
> 
> There are a number of songs I feel go well with this chapter (yes, I'm into symphonic metal, so sue me):  
> "Get Out of My Head" - The Dark Element  
> "No More" - Nemesea  
> "Holy Ground" - Within Temptation

~*~ Twenty ~*~

Tom’s arm was warm about her shoulders, a welcome protection from the raging blizzard as they stumbled through the streets of Hogsmeade. It had taken them several hours to make it out of bed that morning and she was pleasantly sore in ways that made her blush. Even after all these years, all the other boys, sex with Tom was a revelation. She longed to return to his bed, to feel the slide of his heated flesh against hers, to feel him throbbing deep within her, claiming her completely.

A shiver shook her frame and Tom dropped a sloppy kiss to her cheek. “All in good time, precious.”

His voice was dark and sensual, a promise of wicked delight. She shuddered again. “I can hardly wait.”

He chuckled against her skin, the vibration sending heat rushing through her. She squirmed, just barely curbing the urge to beg him to take her into the nearest alley and drive into her until they were both satisfied. “Before I can ravish you properly, Ms. Gable, I believe you have a new gown to purchase. I have quite the plans for next week, so I expect you to get quite the dress.”

Hermione sighed. Right. She’d forgotten entirely that she was supposed to go to Madam Mayberry’s with Aurelia. “I suppose I’m late already.”

“No, just on time,” he assured, motioning to where Aurelia stood in front of the colorful storefront, dress robes of all styles floating in the window, enchanted to swirl and sway.

Aurelia waved and Hermione smiled before turning to stare up at Tom, basking in the light of his adoration for a long moment. “You don’t mind?”

“Of course not,” he replied with a lazy smile. “I have an errand or two to run myself. I’ll meet you back at the castle for dinner.”

The kiss he dropped on Hermione’s ready lips was indecent for a busy street corner, but she didn’t care. The hot swipe of his tongue against hers was a promise of further delight, a promise she would hold him to the minute they were alone again. Her breath was an unsteady pant by the time Tom was backing down the street, a decidedly wicked gleam in his enthralling eyes.

“Oh, come on you,” Aurelia griped, appearing at her side.

Hermione giggled, a hand over her mouth as Aurelia propelled them into the dress and robe shop. “Sorry… it’s just…”

“He turns you into a sex crazed maniac?” Her tone was amused, but her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Yes, I think I’d have to be blind not to notice.”

Heat rushed up her neck and Hermione was suddenly very focused on the rack of ruby dresses to her left. “So, Tom said he wants an impressive dress… and it’s Valentine’s Day, so definitely red. What do you think?”

“I think you should find an open fitting room and I’ll handle the dress selection. That way it’ll be tasteful and flirty, not downright sultry. You’re not to be trusted.”

Aurelia made a shooing motion toward the back of the store where Hermione could see the fitting room curtains in a semicircle about a raised dais, full length mirrors hanging between rooms. Sighing, she trudged further back. A single curtain hung open and only partially. Eying it with suspicion, Hermione paused at the entrance.

Before she could react, an arm had snaked around her waist, hauling her against a firm body. The curtain slid shut and familiar stormy eyes glared down at her.

“Forgive me.” That was her only warning before he pointed his wand squarely between her eyes and hissed “ _Legilimens_ ”

For a moment she fought the invasion, but then he cracked through a different shield, one that she hadn’t created, and the appalling truth crashed over her like a bucket of frigid water. She dropped every defense and let him in, let him plunder every facet of her consciousness and subconscious, let him scour her thoughts until she felt him everywhere at once. Until he knew without a doubt what had been done to her and she finally understood why he’d always been so afraid.

She was shaking, shaking so hard she barely stood within the steady circle of Malfoy’s arms. She imagined it was something like waking from a coma. She remembered everything in between, but it was hazy, like she’d been behind frosted glass with one eye closed. And the frost didn’t begin after their battle in DADA. No, it began that first day in the Great Hall when he’d caught her eyes for the first time, when he’d been nothing but a target, attractive, but a known evil. Tom Riddle had been inside her head from the very first moment they’d laid eyes on each other.

Her stomach roiled and suddenly she was dry heaving into Malfoy’s shirt. He didn’t say anything, didn’t even pull away. If anything, his grip on her tightened, his fingers digging into the fabric of her jumper. It was a long while before she could breathe steadily enough to speak, the reality of what Tom had taken from her cutting razor sharp into her lungs with every inhale.

“Did you know?” Her voice was a ghost, thin and transparent.

“Not for sure. At least, not for a long time.” His hand stroked through her hair, reminding her of a mother soothing a child, all care and quiet understanding. “I suspected he might try something, but I didn’t sense anything when I first started helping you with Occlumency. The bastard was sneakier than I’d thought. Plus, at the time you were staying away from him most of the time. I started to suspect I’d missed something when you allowed such a public sexual act, but I knew for sure when I pulled you into my room and you admitted to losing time. I hadn’t been able to figure out how he could create so much architecture in your head without you noticing, but when you told me about the blackouts, it was obvious.”

Her hands trembled against him, clenching in his shirt, fisting the soft cotton. “Did you get rid of it?”

Malfoy hands closed gently over hers, lacing their fingers together as he disengaged her grip on his black tee. “If I get rid of it, he’ll know. He might not know it was me, but he’ll know he doesn’t have complete control over you anymore. You’ll likely be in even more danger than you already are.”

The tears running down her cheeks were hot and heavy, fear made manifest. “I can’t… Godric, Malfoy. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t…”

“I know, I know,” his thumbs were infinitely gentle as they wiped the tears away, the expression on his face breaking her heart. “But we have to survive this, Hermione. We can’t let him win. We can’t have come to the past only to make things a million times worse in the future. We have to destroy him.”

“I just want it all to stop,” she hiccupped, not caring that she was bawling in front of him. It was abundantly clear that she had much larger problems than Draco Malfoy seeing her cry.

“The only way this stops, now and in the future, is with Riddle in the fucking ground, Granger.” He looked as gutted as she felt.

She knew. She knew that now. There was no saving the boy with the hypnotic sapphire eyes. No, that boy was no tragic antihero, he was a manipulative mastermind. He took and took and took until there was nothing in the world left for him to feed upon. He would take her soul and eat it for dinner just to know it was his. Her teeth ground, the taste of salt on her lips. She’d thought she’d known what it was like to hate, but this was something else, something raw and unhinged that came only from a violation so incomprehensible. He’d taken her, mind, body and soul, without permission, without mercy. Her fingers dug into Malfoy’s.

“I’ll kill him.” She wasn’t sure if she actually could, despite the rage flowing unchecked through her veins. She had only killed at a distance before, never anyone she’d known well. Certainly not someone she’d shared a bed with for months. Hermione shoved the doubt away, embracing the rage instead. He would pay, she promised. No matter what happened, she would make him pay.

“Glad we’ve come full circle now.” Malfoy sounded far from glad. “But that brings us back to your choice. I’ve eliminated a lot of what he did in your head, a foul combination of Legilimency, a perversion of the Imperious with a bit of memory magic thrown in, but if I get rid of the architecture he made entirely, he’ll know and you’ll likely be in another type of prison before you can react. So, I can leave it, put it back up, and we can go back for now or I can break it all and we leave right now, go anywhere else. But he will chase us. I wasn’t joking. In his own demented way Riddle loves you. He will not give you up.”

They weren’t prepared to run. Their cover at Hogwarts was paper thin, especially since Riddle likely knew every sordid detail of the life they’d run from. If they just left, there was no telling what he would do and Hermione wasn’t willing to risk it. Her jaw trembled as she stared up at Malfoy, the only option obvious and impossible. “You keep it in place. We have to. Tom likely knows everything, including the Horcruxes. We have to eliminate him before he can make one and he’s going to do that immediately if we don’t pretend everything is normal.”

“I am so sorry to ask this of you.” The truth of his sorrow bled through cloudy eyes, the angular panes of his face taut with unspoken despair. “I know the cost is far too great to bear.”

“Just promise me,” Hermione whispered, voice hoarse and wrong. “Promise me you’ll free me. Promise you’ll eliminate every scrap of him that was ever in my head.”

“I will set you free. I vow it.” Malfoy brought her fingers to his lips, sealing the words with a solemn kiss to her knuckles. The tenderness would have sent pleasant tingles across her skin if the moment hadn’t been so serious, so wrought with all that would not be.

“I didn’t even remember the note you sent me. When you put that shield back up, I’m not going to remember this.” How she wished it wasn’t true, but now she understood just how deep Tom’s talons had sunk. She groaned, shaking her head. “If he knows everything, and I’d say that’s a safe assumption, why doesn’t he kill you?”

Malfoy blinked then a rueful grin settled on his full lips. “Although he has created quite the prison in your mind, I’m fairly certain my disappearance or death would dismantle at least part of it. You’ve known me in both realities and despite having an antagonistic relationship, we do have a relationship. I’m kind of impossible to forget, especially for you.”

He wasn’t wrong. Malfoy had left a deep impression on her from age eleven onward. It hadn’t been a good impression at all, but she supposed he was right on that count too. It didn’t matter that they’d spent half of their lives at odds with each other, only that it had been half of their lives. It seemed Tom was able to redirect her thoughts, not eliminate entire portions of reality. That was a cold comfort indeed. What might have happened if Malfoy hadn’t grabbed her on the top of that tower? If she’d been alone in her confrontation of Riddle? Would she have trusted Dumbledore, even knowing the manipulative lengths he’d gone to use Harry against Voldemort? Or would she have fallen into Tom’s web alone, without a partner to pry the deadly strands apart?

Her hands trembled, the warmth of Malfoy’s grip holding the cold panic at bay. It was useless conjecture now. She was trapped, but by the grace of Merlin, she was not alone. She stared down at their clasped hands, at the scars crisscrossing Malfoy’s pale skin, at the only thing that made sense in a world turned sideways.

“Does Aurelia know?”

“No,” he murmured. “Nothing close to the truth anyway. She just thinks being with Riddle is making you do irrational things. She’s worried about you and wary of him, but has no idea what he’s capable of. I’m trying to keep her out of it as much as possible.”

Hermione let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. “Good. I like her.”

“Me too.” There was a note in voice that made her look up. His lips were twisted in a grimace, as if a physical pain had stolen over him. She glanced down at his leg, but his weight was carefully balanced fully on his right side. His leg might be hurting, but it wasn’t causing the shadow across his angular features.

Hermione sighed. Now was not the time to pry, to try to whittle away at the hard exterior Malfoy kept in place no matter how much she cracked. No, there was the more pressing concern of her Valentine’s Day date with Tom, a date she was fairly certain would end with a ring.

“He’s going to ask me to marry him. Next week.”

“And you’re going to say yes.”

Hermione tore free of him, spinning in a frantic circle inside the cramped dressing room. Trapped here. Trapped everywhere. “Argh!” Her fists beat against his chest, a plea and a denial. He didn’t stop her.

“I wish I could tell you there was another way. But we can’t figure out a plan to kill the bastard in five days, Hermione. He’s smart and he’d see it coming a mile away. So you’re going to be disgustingly under his thrall, just like you’ve been for the last six months. And it’s going to require you to do things you would never do in your right mind. It may even require you to follow through and marry him, but I promise you, I will come for you and you will be free.”

It didn’t seem worth it. She’d known that coming to the past was a desperate move, a last-ditch effort to save her world, but she hadn’t thought about the consequences to her soul, to her life. She hadn’t understood that killing Tom Riddle would not be a wave of a wand and a dark spell, but rather the sacrifice of everything that made her real, that held the broken shards of her life together. To think she’d thought Tom put her pieces back together, healed her pain. He’d put her pieces together all right, but only because he’d stolen her mind and made her into an object of his own creation. To be admired and used, not alive and aware. And she was going to let Malfoy strip away her free will again, return her to that dungeon within her mind, to be used, body and soul, by a boy with hunger in his veins and destruction in his eyes. She was going to destroy herself yet again and for what? For a better future? For a world that deserved no such sacrifice?

Malfoy’s hands were on her shoulders, firm and real, shaking her gently. Her rage had faded, her hands limp by her sides now. His fingers trailed a path of warmth up the column of her neck before cupping her cheeks, at once gentle and determined. “I promise, Hermione.”

He was blurry, a sure sign the tears were back, if they had ever left. “I don’t want…”

“I know,” His voice was soft, as beleaguered as she felt. “I know. I wouldn’t ask this of you if it wasn’t absolutely necessary. I’ve even thought of asking Dumbledore for help, but he knows too much about me. Too much of what you knew about the war. He’ll never believe I’m truly trying to help you unless I let him in my head. And I… I can’t do that. I wish I could, I wish I hadn’t…” He trailed off, shaking his head, that same haunting pain splayed across his angular features. “So I need time to figure this out, but I will work as fast as possible, I promise you.”

“What if you don’t?” It hurt to ask, but knowing Tom as she did now, it seemed likely Malfoy wouldn’t succeed.

His eyes cracked, sorrow leaking through. “I won’t fail. I’ve spent the last three years preparing for this fight.”

His words made no sense. Until six months ago, he’d spent the last three years fighting for Voldemort, killing and torturing with an abandon that had earned him the title of monster in most civilized circles. She might believe that something greater lay behind those enigmatic eyes, but she knew the facts. Draco Malfoy was a Death Eater in the extreme. He might not have wanted the job, but he had flourished in the role, his talent for pain inhuman. And yet the man standing before her was no cold-blooded killer, no architect of human suffering. No, he was her protector, the only thing that stood between her and a life without agency, without power, a life of Tom Riddle’s design. She still didn’t understand him.

“We don’t have much time.” Malfoy’s thumbs swept over her cheeks, hot tears smearing in their wake.

Hermione wasn’t ready. “I…”

Malfoy’s lips were soft against her temple. “I’m so sorry.”

Then his wand was there and her mind was shattering all over again, the pieces flickering and fading until there was… a dress of the brightest ruby, iridescent with enchanted sequins lining the bodice. She smiled as she picked it up. The heart-shaped bodice would be flattering with its empire waist. The skirt was layered with delicate lace over a deep satin that slipped like water between her fingers. It was perfect. She could just imagine the slide of the sensual fabric against her skin as Tom pushed up the skirts, deviant grin on his face promising pleasure.

Anticipation thrumming down her spine, she tore off her jumper and jeans before sliding into the dress. As expected, it was perfect, the fabric cool and silky against her exposed skin. Hermione grinned. Tom would be so pleased.


	21. Twenty One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all of your responses as we go along this journey. I truly enjoy hearing how you feel about this story. For a lot of you there was a big sigh of relief to know that Hermione wasn't acting entirely of her own accord over the events of the first half of this narrative. The the degree to which that is true will continue to be examined in future chapters.
> 
> This chapter is hard. This was not an easy chapter to write and I doubt it will be an easy chapter to read. Until now you haven't known the full extent of Tom's control and even still, he hasn't forced Hermione into anything she might not have wanted otherwise (Great Hall scene excepted). This is different. Hermione's consent here is dubious at best and Draco's participation is downright nonconsensual. Remember that Tom is a formidable enemy and they are currently lost in a sea of really bad options. Tom does, however, have a purpose here beyond the obvious, so kudos if you can identify what that is.
> 
> WARNINGS: Sexual content, dubious consent/non-con, canon violence

~*~ Twenty One ~*~

The fire was hot at her back, the din of the Slytherin common room comforting as Hermione leaned against Tom, her head listing against his shoulder as he spoke in low tones to the boys sitting beside him. She could hear the words, could see their brows furrow and raise, and yet no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t concentrate on their conversation. It had been happening more often than she’d like to admit. When she’d brought up the struggle to focus with Tom, he’d reminded her of the lingering effects the war had wrought upon her, suggesting that perhaps the stress of a new school was finally catching up with her. But there was a twisting in her gut, an unease that told her something greater lurked beneath the surface than her usual demons.

Sighing, she gave up trying to listen to Tom and the others, focusing instead on the pleasant vibration of his chest. She studied the common room, noting that Malfoy was sitting across the room facing off against Cygnus Black in a round of Wizarding Chess that had both boys’ brows drawn in concentration. Beyond them, Aurelia and several other Slytherin girls sat on cushions around a coffee table, parchment rolls scattered haphazardly as they worked diligently on their latest assignments. Hermione had already finished her homework for the next week, partially in preparation for the trip she was taking with Tom on Valentine’s Day and partially because coursework was one of the few things unaffected by her sudden inability to concentrate on mundane tasks.

Tom shifted abruptly next to her and Hermione’s head smacked against the back of the couch. She blinked and stared up at him. He smiled down at her, ebony waves dipping down to shadow one luminous eye, his full lips pulling into an alluring smile that had her breath catching. “Don’t fret, precious. I just have to go get your dear friend.”

It took her a long moment to figure out he meant Malfoy and not Aurelia. The barely disguised scorn gave it away. Despite Malfoy being an integral part of Tom’s operation now, it was clear the two were never going to be friends. Hermione scowled. “Dacian is hardly my friend.”

“So you keep saying,” Tom murmured, eyes rolling. “Stay put, would you?”

Hermione shrugged. There was nowhere else she wanted to go. “Yes, of course.”

Tom bent, tracing a trail of fire across the sensitive skin of her jaw before dropping a brief, but indulgent kiss on her trembling lips. “Good girl.”

Then he strode confidently across the room to where Malfoy sat, lips pursed in thought, focus narrowed to the chess board in front of him. Tom paused before the two players, letting each make another move before gesturing to Malfoy. Malfoy flashed Tom a glare that seemed to harbor more than mere annoyance at a chess matched interrupted, but nodded and followed Tom back to the sofa by the fireplace. Tom sank back into his place beside Hermione while Malfoy perched gingerly on the adjacent green velvet armchair, body rigid with tension.

“What do you want, Riddle?” The other boys always spoke to Tom with deference, at least as far as she could remember, but Malfoy seemed to derive a modicum of pleasure from being as obstinate as possible while still playing the part.

Tom’s eyes slid over to Hermione, a darkness gleaming within them that had her pulse racing from a twisted combination of fear and excitement. Just a look. That’s all it took to muddle her brain and make up become down, sense into chaos.

“We’re going to be taking a trip tomorrow.” Hermione frowned, a hand coming up to rub her temples. Was Valentine’s Day already tomorrow? Where had the time gone? Did her struggles with focus include losing more time than she’d recalled? The throbbing in her temples ramped up, her brain suddenly an impenetrable haze. What the bloody hell was going on with her?

Tom took one of her hands, gently running his lithe fingers across her palm before tracing light circles at the base of her wrist. The touch was featherlight and enthralling. The drumbeat in her head receded. She sighed in relief, allowing herself to surrender to the pleasure of his touch.

“So I need someone in charge while I’m gone.”

They were still talking, Hermione realized. Malfoy kept his stormy gaze firmly on Tom. “What does that have to do with me?”

“Everything.” Tom’s smile was all predator, but Malfoy didn’t so much as bat an eye. “I don’t trust any of these morons. Maybe Cygnus, but even he has another agenda. But you. You, my dear friend, are properly motivated. And fully capable of keeping the others in check. You may hold back during our sparring sessions, but I can sense just how much potential you’re keeping from me.”

If Malfoy was unnerved by Tom’s uncanny observation, he didn’t let it show. Instead, he smiled back, all teeth and reckless insolence. “What exactly do you think you have over my head, Riddle?”

Tom’s hand slipped from hers, tracing an unmistakable path across her thigh. Hermione’s breath caught. No matter how many times they’d done this, his touch never failed to electrify her. He stared at Malfoy, lips twisted into a vicious grin. “Need I say more, Mallet?”

Malfoy rolled his eyes, all bored indolence as he sighed, “you really must stop thinking that just because I’m attracted to your girlfriend, I’m head over heels for her. I honestly couldn’t care less about the slag. Is watching you paw at her amusing? Certainly, but hardly grounds for any feelings of jealousy on my part, Riddle. Shag her in front of me for all I care; it isn’t going to make me your bitch.”

Hermione gaped. Had she known Malfoy felt that way about her? She felt an inkling that perhaps she had, but then it was gone. She swallowed, mouth suddenly dry as she stared at him. He didn’t bother to glance her way, turbulent eyes locked with icy cobalt. His midnight hair was tied at the nape of his neck tonight. A few lone dark strands had fallen loose, framing his angular jaw and sharp cheek bones. Again, she was surprised by how different he was from the boy she remembered. This man was dark and dangerous and not just on the outside. He stared down Tom with an ease that sent chills prickling through her.

The sharp peal of Tom’s laughter split the tension. “Is that so?” Malfoy merely arched a dark brow. “Then I’d advise you to put your money where your mouth is.”

“What do you suggest?” Malfoy sounded bored.

The look in Tom’s eye had Hermione pulling away before she could think better of it. His hand dropped from her skirt, but moved to her wrist, his grip loose, but ironclad. He tugged her to stand before sneering down his nose at Malfoy, still seated in the armchair watching the scene with lazy disinterest.

“Join us.”

“This is stupid.”

“Then why not join? If you don’t care either way, it won’t be that bad, will it, Mallet?” There was a note of smug victory in Tom’s words.

“There are less crass ways to test my loyalty, Riddle.” Now Malfoy sounded mildly annoyed, as if Tom had taken his favorite quill or some other minor infraction.

“Would you rather I invite Malfoy?”

The other Malfoy. The one who left her feeling dirty every time his icy gray eyes met hers. Her Malfoy might be related to him, but they were clearly very different people. Hermione shook her head desperately. Whatever madness Tom was planning, she did not want the blond asshole anywhere near it. Stormy eyes shot to her for a millisecond, unbridled fury licking at the surface for a heartbeat before he turned back to Tom.

“For the record, I think this is ridiculous.”

“Duly noted, Mallet.” Tom’s grip on her wrist tightened a fraction as he led the way up the stairs to the boys’ dormitory and into his room. The door clicked shut and then Tom was waving his wand in an elaborate locking spell that Hermione had never seen before.

“Wands,” Tom demanded, motioning toward a box sitting on his desk. Malfoy rolled his eyes and dutifully dropped his wand into the container, stepping back to allow Hermione to follow suit. Tom settled his on top before closing the box and applying a wandless locking spell, a potent reminder that he was hardly powerless without the wand secured inside.

Malfoy leaned against the door, arms crossed over his chest. “Now what?”

Tom’s lips traced the curve of her ear before sucking gently at the skin below. Hermione sighed, collapsing back against him. “Now you watch.”

Hermione was breathless as Tom pulled her clothing off one piece at a time. It was maddeningly slow and she could hardly resist the urge to do it herself, to eliminate the layers between them in an instant. But it was clear Tom was putting on a show and she was powerless to stop him. A part of her knew Malfoy shouldn’t be there, was even horrified that he was seeing her like this, but every time Tom’s fingers traced over her skin, the knowledge was gone, like a switch turned off. So she let it fade away until there was only the hot burn of Tom’s lips across her bare skin and the frantic pulse of pleasure between her legs.

He’d backed her up to the bed, had her splayed out over the emerald sheets as his tongue thrust into her, each stroke eliciting a debauched moan from her raw throat. He flicked his tongue along her, causing a burst of pleasure that sent tremors ricocheting through her. Tom pulled away, her arousal dripping from his swollen lips. “Look at him when I make you come, precious.”

She’d forgotten about Malfoy. Hermione dragged her lust drenched eyes up to focus on him. He had his bottom lip caught between his teeth, his pupils unmistakably dilated as they stared back at her. But there was more than want in those eyes, there was sorrow, so deep it nearly chased away the sensations Tom was evoking. But then his fingers were driving into her at just the right angle and she was shattering completely, stormy eyes following her decent.

Tom’s dark chuckle had her swimming back to reality. “Get over here, Mallet.”

Malfoy blinked, clearly surprised by the request. “You told me to watch.”

“You’ve watched plenty. I want you to know exactly what you can’t have.” The cruel twist of Tom’s lips, still gleaming with her, had Hermione inching backward. But then those sapphire eyes swung to her and she relaxed. Tom would never hurt her. No, he was the one that held her demons at bay, who saved her from the emptiness the war had left behind.

Malfoy moved stiffly to stand beside the bed, not hiding his disgust. “This is bloody absurd, Riddle. She’s your bloody girlfriend, not mine.”

“Exactly. Not yours.” Tom’s teeth were bared, more snarl than smile.

“I’ve gotten the message loud and clear.”

Tom thrust an arm out, yanking Malfoy to him. The older boy stumbled, just barely holding himself upright. Tom was still wearing slacks, but now Malfoy was pressed up against his shirtless chest. They’d never been so close; she’d never realized how tall or muscular they both were, mirror images of each other. In a physical brawl, they’d be evenly matched.

Tom took hold of Malfoy’s jaw with his hand, still slick with her. “I don’t believe you have.” Malfoy didn’t twist out of the grip, didn’t do anything beyond scowling. “You think you’re better than me, Mallet, but you aren’t. You’ll do what I say, when I say it. Because you’re mine, just like she is.”

“You’re not my type,” Malfoy snarled, façade cracking.

“But she is.” There was a chilling humor crackling behind those cobalt eyes. “How about you get a taste of what will never be yours?”

“What?” Storm ridden eyes were blown wide now.

“Kiss her, touch her.”

“No.”

“That wasn’t a request, Mallet.” There was a crackle of magic at the tips of Tom’s fingers, there and gone in a moment. But whatever it was, Malfoy froze. His faced was haunted, all life drained in a matter of moments as he sank to his knees beside the bed. A shaky hand pulled Hermione upright, bringing them face to face. Malfoy’s breath was a barely controlled pant, hot against her cheek. She let a hand raise, wander over his broken features, across his trembling lips. His skin was hot, belying the ghostly pallor Tom’s spell had induced.

“It’s okay,” she breathed, barely audible, onto his parted lips.

Malfoy hovered for a moment longer, suspended in a hell she did not quite understand. But then he shuddered and closed the gap between them. His lips were soft, gentler than Tom had ever been.

“You could kiss your mother like that, Mallet.”

Tom’s sharp reprimand was a cold reminder of how wrong this was. Why was Malfoy doing this? Hermione began to pull away, but Malfoy’s hand at the nape of her neck stopped her. He shifted the angle of his lips and then he was truly kissing her and Hermione couldn’t remember why she’d been pulling away. If Tom’s touch was all hot sparks, Malfoy’s was cool rain and sunshine, like coming home. There was a heat, but it was less desperate, more fulfilling. His mouth tasted like mint and the promise of tomorrow. She found herself relaxing, her hands twining in the silken locks of his hair, her tongue chasing his not in a dance of dominance, but in a playful exploration. Even the heat between her thighs was different now, no longer impatient and searching for the next high, but content to led the need build slowly, to relish every caress.

The pleasure was ripped away from her, Malfoy crashing to the other side of the room as Tom bared down on him. He pulled him from the floor, slamming Malfoy into the door with enough force to send a shock through the room. Then Tom’s mouth was on his, a poor imitation of kiss, more violence than caress. A second later Tom swept his tongue over Malfoy’s lips before releasing his grip on his shoulders, icy cobalt gaze fastened on the surging storm of Malfoy’s eyes. The mirror in the corner of the room only reflected so much, but the hunger, the raw satisfaction on Tom’s face as he spoke, had Hermione on the verge of fleeing, the promise of his touch be damned. “I think I got all of her. Now all you can taste is me. If you ever touch her again, remember this will be the price.”

Malfoy sank to his knees, which surprised her. But a moment later the movement made sense as Tom leveled a hand at him. “ _Crucio_.”

He stayed upright for a second or two, but then crashed sideways, left leg spasming. Tom didn’t relent, not until there was blood trailing from Malfoy’s gaping mouth. Malfoy hadn’t made a single sound, which shook Hermione, sorrow cracking the haze for a long moment. He’d clearly endured the Cruciatus Curse before, likely on a regular basis.

Tom turned back to her and for a moment she saw nothing but a monster. Then he smiled and Hermione thoughts went thick as molasses. Running a hand through his ebony curls, he crossed the space between them. “I believe we have some unfinished business, Ms. Granger.”

She collapsed back on the bed, gesturing for him to join her. “Of course, Mr. Riddle.”

The smile on his face was wicked, full of satisfaction and promise. She rubbed her legs together in anticipation and he chuckled, the sound sending ripples of pleasure through her. A dexterous finger hooked under her chin as he sank down to the mattress, his body hovering mere centimeters from her.

“All mine.”


	22. Twenty Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Thank you all. Your comments are truly inspirational to me. I have never had this much support when writing/posting a story before and you all are making this a very special experience for me. So thank you from the bottom of my heart. I hope you all continue to be well.
> 
> This chapter is as intense as those that came before. I promise the suffering will not go on forever, but there is so much that changes after this. We are finally at the midpoint of the story, at the moment when we topple over yet another precipice.
> 
> WARNINGS: Graphic descriptions of violence

~*~ Twenty Two ~*~

The skies were grey, the shade of Malfoy’s eyes when they fragmented to show his suffering. It was an odd thought, a thought that didn’t make sense on a romantic outing with her boyfriend. Hermione felt like she was under water, drowning slowly, but surely as each moment passed. The weight on her chest was growing with every step she and Tom took away from the Hogwarts grounds, but she couldn’t figure out why. Why did it feel like she was marching to her death? To one of those battles that took far more than she was willing to pay? Why did it feel like she was in the middle of a war yet again?

She shivered, from far more than the February chill, and tightened her grip on Tom’s hand. Her brilliant scarlet gown dragged lightly over the snow, but it was charmed to resist the effects of the weather. The woolen cloak slung over her shoulders was equally charmed, holding the cold firmly at bay. And yet, she was frigid, as if not a single layer stood between her and the elements.

Tom pulled her closer to his side, arm wrapping protectively about her shoulders. “Just a few more minutes before we’re outside the wards.”

Hermione settled in against him, seeking comfort in the pressure of his strong frame and steady breaths. “Sorry, I’m just feeling out of sorts.”

“No worries, precious.” He dropped a soft kiss on her brow. “Everything will be put to rights soon enough.”

She wasn’t sure what he could possibly mean by that, but was too exhausted to care. Perhaps getting away was just the thing she needed. It would give her the freedom to examine her feelings away from the oppressive castle and its many eyes. Away from Malfoy. A flicker of panic trailed through her at the thought, unbidden and inexplicable. But it was better to be away from him. Wasn’t it? The same gut-wrenching pang tore through her again.

A hand on her cheek had her focusing on Tom and not the riot within. “Here we go.” He pulled a small carved stone from his pocket using a handkerchief.

“No apparation?”

Tom shook his head, ebony curls bouncing gently. “Goodness, no. That’s far too trackable. I’m just of age and don’t have complete freedom yet.”

Hermione blinked. Sometime during their liaison, she’d forgotten the extent of their age difference. She’d been old for her year anyway and with three years of war in addition, she was nearly five years older than Tom. But nothing in their dynamic had ever reflected that fact, which was likely why she’d forgotten how much of a child he technically was. Because in reality, there was nothing childlike about Tom Riddle, not the sensuous curve of his lips, or his seductive prowess in the bedroom and definitely not his magical skill, wanded or no.

“So portkey instead?” She eyed the carved stone, the sharp angles coming together to form a coiled serpent.

Looking down at the carving, Tom smiled darkly and murmured something that sounded an awful lot like parseltongue. Realizing quickly she wasn’t supposed to know that, she continued to stare at him, waiting for further instruction. His cobalt eyes were alit with a fervor that sent chills down her spine despite the heat of his arm about her shoulders. The planes of his cheeks were sharp in the harsh light of day, giving him a severe look that made him very much more man than boy.

“Are you ready to change the world, Hermione Granger?”

Hermione inhaled sharply. She couldn’t recall ever telling Tom her full name. She knew he was aware Gable wasn’t her true name, but she was absolutely sure he didn’t know it was Granger. But then she remembered hearing it from his lips before and wasn’t sure at all. Tom chuckled, bringing his fervent stare to fix upon her.

She smiled back, unable to resist such ardor. “Let’s.”

Tom laced their fingers together and placed them on the cold serpent. The world spun out from under her feet. She was falling, she was lost, she was nothing. Then she was in Tom’s arms, standing at the foot of a hill with a grand manor house at the top of it. And in an instant, she knew. It was a fissure in the haze, a memory so clear it broke down every barrier until there was only truth. It was Riddle House and they were in Little Hangleton. A scream began to form within her, built upon the absolute knowledge that nothing good would happen here, that she had stumbled into something far beyond her control.

As her lips parted, Tom grinned down at her, all edges and undisguised malice, and she closed her mouth, the urge to fight gone as suddenly as it had appeared. “Ready to meet the in-laws?”

“In-laws,” she croaked out, emotion ricocheting through her too fast to comprehend.

“I hope you don’t mind, precious, but I’ve arranged something of a special ceremony at my father’s house. I figured the whole family should be there for our nuptials, even if they are worthless Muggle filth.”

Hermione sagged against him, unable to draw a steady breath. “What?”

“I’m so very pleased with the scarlet gown. It will be the perfect wedding dress.” He was staring down at her with such ardent hunger, with eyes that could light the world on fire.

“You never asked me.” It was all she could think to say, all that she could begin to understand beyond the chaos.

“That’s easily remedied,” Tom retorted, boyish smile chasing away the harsh edges of his hunger. He dropped to a knee on the frozen lawn, molten sapphire eyes staring up at her with promises she couldn’t decipher. “Hermione Jean Granger, you are the brightest witch I have ever met, the most powerful woman I have ever known. I did not believe in partnerships or marriage before you came into my life, but now I can’t imagine a world without you in it. I love you and I promise I will always provide for you and protect you. Will you do me the honor of being my wife?”

It was a perfect speech, everything she might have ever dreamed a man would say in such a moment. Better even than Ron’s the week before the war stole a future from both of them. So why was there an unease in her veins, a prickle of fear that had no place in such a moment? But Tom kept his eyes on hers and as the moments passed, the doubt dripped away until there was only one word she could say.

“Yes.”

His mouth was on hers in an instant, devouring every last shred of her sanity until there was only pleasure and need, only the certainty she could not exist without him. Tom pulled reluctantly back, breath harsh and lips bruised. “We have a ceremony to make, precious.”

She followed him up the manicured lawn, to the manor entrance lined with Grecian columns and trimmed hedges. He rang the bell twice before stepping back, an arm wrapping tightly about Hermione. A maid answered the door, smiling brightly when she saw them.

“Mr. Riddle. Your father and grandparents are expecting you in the drawing room. Your grandmother was able to convince the local reverend to officiate.” She glanced Hermione up and down, a frown settling on her lips. “Is that what you’re wearing, miss? I can look—”

“Yes,” Tom interrupted smoothly, ushering Hermione into the foyer. “That is what she’s wearing, Matilda. I would thank you to mind your own business.”

Matilda looked like she wanted to say something, but held her tongue. “Of course, Master Riddle. Your family is this way.”

The halls were lit with bright sconces that illuminated masterful oil paintings, landscapes and portraits in equal number. Hermione had never been anywhere quite so grand or old fashioned. The castle at Hogwarts was timeless, but this made clear how very different life in 1944 was. And the Riddles. She was about to meet Tom Riddle’s family. The family that she was very sure he had slaughtered in another lifetime. But there had been no fear in Matilda’s eyes, no sluggish movements or delayed words to indicate the effect of the Imperius. It seemed that in this reality Tom Riddle, Jr. was welcome at Riddle House. She couldn’t tell if that fact disturbed her or not.

The hall opened to a sunny room, the elaborates drapes tied back to let the mid-day sunshine spill across the claw-footed furniture and grand piano. Four people stood in the room, turning as one to face them. It was immediately clear who Tom Riddle, Sr. was. Tom was the spitting image of his father, from the ebony locks to the full lips and handsomely cut jaw. Even their eyes glittered with identical sapphire pupils, although Tom’s were darker, more mercurial than his father’s innocent stare. The older couple by the piano were certainly his grandparents, which left the remaining man to be the reverend Matilda had mentioned.

To her surprise, Tom’s father crossed the room swiftly, engulfing his son in a fierce hug. “Good to see you, son. I’m honored you and your bride are to be wed here.”

Tom’s smile didn’t reach his eyes as he returned the embrace. “I wanted it to be memorable for all of us.”

His father nodded absently, pulling away to motion to the reverend. “This is Reverend Phillips. I hope he is what you were looking for.”

“He’ll do.” Tom’s smile was all charm as he shook the man’s hand. “My future wife and I would like a simple, traditional ceremony. Nothing fancy.”

“Easily done,” the man assured, his eyes tracing distastefully over Hermione’s scarlet gown. But he didn’t comment and Tom moved along to introduce Hermione to the assorted family members.

There was a period of chaos as the wedding came together, Tom’s grandmother playing segments of different hymns one after another, his grandfather limping over to the settee and then over to an armchair, seeming unsatisfied with either. And then there were the father and son, identical heads bent together in discussion with the minister, Bible pages flipping frantically between them.

Hermione felt utterly apart from it all, as if it were a movie she was watching on the television and not her own life, let alone her own wedding. The unease was back with a vengeance, but she still couldn’t seem to discern the root of the feeling. She’d decided to chalk it up to the absurdity of being married in the Riddle House by the time the preparations calmed and Tom’s father motioned for her to come stand beside him at the entrance to the parlor.

“My dear boy mentioned your parents are no longer with you,” he said as she approached. Hermione nearly froze on the spot, only momentum propelling her to finish the journey. She’d never talked about her parents with Tom. Not with anyone. Not even Harry. It had been a year into the war when she’d found out her plan to send them into hiding had been all for not. The Death Eaters hadn’t gotten to Mr. and Mrs. Granger, but an armed robber in Melbourne had. Both had been fatally stabbed in a scuffle to defend their belongings. Without the record of Hermione’s existence in their lives, she hadn’t found out about their brutal demise until six months after the fact, far too late to attend the funeral. No, all she’d been left with was a grave on a continent she’d never visited and the horrible knowledge that they’d died without knowing they had a daughter.

Mr. Riddle, Sr. grasped her arm gently, sky blue eyes wide with concern as he bent toward her. “I apologize. I didn’t realize it was such a sensitive subject, Miss Granger. I was merely going to offer my services to walk you down the aisle.”

Her mind spun, suddenly off kilter again. This was a wedding. Her wedding. She smiled as best she could, sure it was more grimace than grin. “I accept your kind offer, Mr. Riddle.”

The walk across the parlor, to some spirited hymn Tom’s grandmother played, and the ensuing vows were a blur. All Hermione could seem to concentrate on was Tom, his lips moving with words she almost understood. Even when she spoke her vows, it seemed she could hardly comprehend what she said, like she was underwater or in a violent windstorm, the words lost as soon as they were uttered.

Before she knew it, Tom’s lips were on hers, soft and warm and everything they’d always promised to be, a harbor against any storm. When he pulled away, the smile on his face was bright, his features boyish and innocent. Hermione pulled him back to her, suddenly sure, the unease finally consumed by the infectious joy she felt on his lips. Whatever else, this was the man who had saved her, had taken her from the depths of despair and transformed her suffering into something bearable. She was under no illusions he was a good man, but he was hers. The affection as he kissed her, his strong hands reverent as they threaded through her loose hair, was undeniably genuine. Her body shook with the tidal wave of emotion that followed the realization. Tom had found a way to fix her, to give her the peace she had been chasing, to quiet her riotous soul. It as a gift for which she would forever be in his debt. Trembling, she clung to him, letting the waves of pleasure from his caresses cascade through her until there was nothing but quiet surrender.

Sometime later, perhaps hours or mere minutes, he pulled away, his forehead resting gently against hers. The heady satisfaction that sung in her blood shone through his liquid eyes. “My wife.”

Her lips curved. “My husband.”

Tom captured her lips in another fevered kiss before pulling reluctantly away. “As much as it pains me, there’s still business to attend to before we give into the carnal delights of consummating this marriage.”

“Business?”

His lips contorted from the gentle smile that set her soul at ease to a cruel line of grim determination. “You can’t truly believe I love my filthy Muggle relatives so completely, can you?”

For a moment there was only blind panic shooting down her spine, an echo of a truth she couldn’t remember. Then there was a numb horror as Tom spun away from her, wand dropping into his hand with practiced ease. The Riddles erupted into chaos, voices intermingling as they stared at the wand in confusion. Tom only smiled, hard and wrong, the stuff of nightmares and vicious fairy tales. “Oh, come now, you can’t be surprised.” His biting stare focused in on his father. “You had to have known what my mother was. Isn’t that why you abandoned her and her unborn child? Why you left her to die on the streets and prayed you’d never see her again?”

Tom Riddle, Sr. was staring like he’d seen a ghost and Hermione supposed he had. Merope Gaunt had enchanted him, forced him into marriage and fatherhood. But Tom’s father was hardly innocent in the matter. She’d always been sure his choice to abandon his wife and child had played a pivotal role in Tom’s decent into darkness. It was apparent now that she’d been right.

Tom was an avenging angel as he stared down his father, wand held carelessly before him. “I told you I didn’t have a lick of my mother’s blood in my veins. I told you I never knew about her family or her heritage. I lied, father. I am the direct descent of Salazar Slytherin, one of the most powerful wizards to ever live. And I will be more powerful than he when I master even death himself.”

Hermione froze, gut twisting in surprise. He was different. He was supposed to be different now. He loved her, he wanted more than power. So why was he standing before his father with murder in his eyes and the thirst for power on his lips?

Tom’s flinty eyes swung sideways to Hermione. “I apologize, my darling wife, that you have to bear witness to this tragedy, but your presence is required.”

Then he was turning back to his father, wand waving. “ _Imperio_.”

The horror on Tom Riddle, Sr.’s face went slack, his body loosening as he came to stand before his son. Tom didn’t look away as he instructed, “Matilda darling, would you be so kind as to bring me a kitchen knife?”

The maid was out the door in seconds, demeanor as calm as when she’d ushered them into the house. Tom must have already had her under the Imperius, despite Hermione’s original conclusion to the contrary. Her hands shook as she shrunk back, legs hitting the settee. Tom glanced over at the movement, hypnotic sapphire eyes finding hers in an instant. The moment they locked gazes, the panic eased from her throat, the thumping of hear heart returning to a steady rhythm. His lips moved, unmistakably mouthing _trust me_. She nodded, sinking down on the settee, clinging to his stare like a drowning woman.

Matilda was back, knife flashing in her outstretched hand. Tom’s attention shifted back to his father. The older man took the knife and turned toward his parents. Their screams were instant and ghastly. Hermione shook, unable or unwilling to look away as the son slashed the knife across their throats, mechanically and without a hint of emotion. The sudden scent of metallic gore had her retching onto the oriental rug below, her mind lost in a labyrinth of bloody memories.

A warm hand pulled her upright, cradling her gently, cool lips brushing over her ashen skin. “Just a little bit longer, precious.”

She could almost breathe again as Tom grasped her shoulders. Slowly, she raised her eyes to survey the carnage. Tom Riddle, Sr. stood before them, blood-spattered and eerily silent, while his parents lay still as the grave, blood soaking into the rug beneath them. The reverend had departed directly after the ceremony, leaving Matilda as the only other living person in the room. But she stood aloof at the entrance to the room, clearly unable to comprehend the scene playing out before her.

Tom’s features softened a hair as he smiled down at Hermione. “I learned from the last time. I made the mistake of killing them using magic and I only got away with it because I was lucky. But now, now there is no unnatural explanation to what has happened here. Dear old dad simply lost his mind after his son’s wedding. He turned on all of us, but somehow his son and new bride fought back. A horrible business. Best swept under the rug, madness like that.”

Tom pulled a piece of parchment from his suit pocket. “But before we alert the proper authorities, there is another essential part of this business.”

Eyes narrowing, Tom began speaking softly, the words of an intricate spell that seemed almost familiar. As he continued speaking the dark, haunting words the air grew thicker, laden with the thrum of magic. She could almost see the current of energy stretching from Tom to his father and then to… her. She could feel it, the unfamiliar tingle at the base of her spine, the knot of tension that was not her own. It continued to tighten, discomfort turning to pain as the energy began to twist outward, consuming every inch of her in a tightly bound web of slimy darkness. She could hardly breath now, tendrils of inky anguish chasing every labored breath.

Tom called out a final time, voice harsh, sounding as laden with suffering as she felt. Then he was upon his father, knife between his deft fingers as the blade slid between ribs and into the heart of the man before him. There was a wet, gurgling cough and then silence. An instant later the web of darkness shifted, tightening beyond comprehension, beyond pain, cutting into her very soul. She felt its chilling caress beneath her skin, as if a ghost were sliding through her marrow, flowing through her blood. It was an invasion of epic and inexplicable proportion.

Laughter, maniacal and sharp, broke through the quiet horror. Tom was coated in blood now too, a cruel imitation of his father’s limp figure. But he was smiling, not in that sadistic way that chilled her to the core, but in the way that convinced her tomorrow as worth fighting for.

“It worked.” The words were jubilant, but soft, spoken with a reverence she did not understand.

Before she could ask, he turned to Matilda, beckoning her closer. The girl came willingly, unaware of the blood soaked scene before her. Tom caressed her face, fingers tracing the sweep of her jaw. “I appreciate your sacrifice.”

“What?” Hermione whispered, but the word was too soft and Tom did not hear.

He was reciting from the parchment again, the same dark energy building in the air. But this time Hermione felt no pressure, no darkness settling beneath her skin. Under considerably less duress, she was able to study the spell more closely, to realize where exactly she’d heard it before. She hadn’t actually heard it, but she had seen it. Seen it in a book, _Secrets of the Darkest Art_.

The air left her lungs in a shuddering gasp. There was a ring in Tom’s hand; not the Gaunt ring, but a wedding ring. His wedding ring. She could almost see the dark web closing around it, gaining substance as he continued the spell, blood now dripping from Matilda’s throat. Hermione could see the darkness flicker, almost breath, as the last of the life slipped from her thin form and into the rug beneath. For a moment there was a dark halo about the ring, but then it sunk beneath the surface of the gold band. Tom slipped the ring onto his finger and turned to Hermione. For one heart-stopping moment she understood, _Horcrux_ reverberating through her mind, but then he was smiling down at her and the bloody magic faded until the only thing left was Tom and his hands on her face, his lips at her brow, even as blood smeared across her scarlet gown.


	23. Twenty Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I continued to be impressed by all of you. Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to drop a line. Your thoughts are always welcome and appreciated. To all of you, I hope you are well and that this day is good for you.
> 
> And here we reach the culmination of the wedding night, where some truths become more apparent and we're reminded even Tom is human, despite what he has done. This, of course, makes him no less the villain here.
> 
> WARNINGS: Mild sexual content.

~*~ Twenty Three ~*~

The skies were dark beyond the manor windows, the turbulent roil of storm clouds blotting out even the moon. The wind was a fierce hiss against the panes, the scrape of branches eerie in the silent room. Hermione stared into the vanity mirror before her, Tom staring back from behind her shoulder with an intensity that shook her. She was used to him encompassing her every sense, drowning out reality and pain and everything in between until all she could understand was him. But now there was an additional layer of her awareness of him, as if he lingered just beneath her skin, a part of her just as surely as her own heart.

Holding her gaze, he drew a pale hand down the length of her throat, tracing the column of her neck and leaving prickling flesh in his wake. He continued the featherlight caress to the sweetheart neckline of her scarlet gown, his nails scraping her skin just beneath the stiff fabric. Hermione trembled, breath stuttering. His lips curved upward, satisfaction leaking from molten sapphire eyes. His hand retreated from her bodice, tracing a path to her throat and settling there, fingers splayed wide. He stooped down until his ebony curls were teasing her, his lips hovering a hair’s breadth from the curve of her ear. But he didn’t speak. Instead he traced her lobe with his dexterous tongue, laving his way across her trembling flesh with languid strokes. A moan escaped her lips, breathy and desperate. He chuckled against her skin, the vibrations echoing through her, spreading heat in their wake.

His grip on her neck tightened, her airflow constricting. She hardly noticed, letting her head fall back against his broad chest. He growled, low and deep and laden with the need that hung like a heavy fog between them. He guided her, never releasing his punishing grip on her neck, across the room. Her legs faltered as they crashed against the bedframe, but Tom kept her upright, his hold unyielding.

Voice a raspy growl, he said, “I want you to feel me everywhere.”

Hermione swallowed as best she could, mouth dry. Then he let go and she dropped to the mattress, gracelessly sprawling before him. He stared down at her as he slowly crawled over her slight frame, all predator. She expected him to lower that all too enticing mouth to hers, but he merely stared, brow furrowing as if he were seeking answers within the depths of her stare. Then he muttered something under his breath, there and gone, swallowed by the wind crashing against the window.

At first she noticed nothing, only the howl of the wind and the tick of a clock in another room of Riddle House. Then she felt it. Darkness coiled beneath her skin, nefarious and yet familiar. And beyond the slimy void was something else entirely. It was nothing but an echo, a pale imitation of emotion, but as Tom continued to stare, eyes wide and pupils darker than midnight, she began to sense the overwhelming need, the insatiable desire. What had been nothing moments ago was now a heady pulse of lust crawling beneath her skin, born of something foreign and unfathomable. It was not her need. That was there too, but distinct, of clearly a different origin than the mounting sensation that threatened to overwhelm her.

Tom’s lips twisted, victory sliding across them. “You feel it, don’t you?” She could do nothing but nod, dazed by the maelstrom building within. He traced a finger across her bottom lip as he explained, “What you feel is me. We’re… connected now. If I choose, I can allow you access to my emotions, likely even more concrete thoughts if I were to truly concentrate on the task.”

“How?” Her lips brushed against the finger he’d left resting upon her mouth.

“You’ll figure it out, Hermione Riddle. You’re a smart girl.”

Harry. The memory came unbidden, drawn from the depths of her consciousness by the darkness stirring within. Harry had been able to sense what Voldemort was feeling, even his location on occasion. But that was because Voldemort had accidently made Harry a Horcrux. Hermione focus snapped to Tom, panic cracking her heart. “I’m a…”

“Horcrux, yes,” he confirmed. “But also…” he paused, suddenly looking away from her, a cord of unease vibrating between them. He shook his head, ebony falling enticingly over his hypnotic eyes. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter now, precious.”

Her blood was pounding now, an impossible combination of lust and fear mingling to yield pure chaos. If he knew he could make her a Horcrux, then he knew everything. And yet that revelation didn’t seem fresh, as if her mind had already traveled down this path, as if she already knew the boy hovering above her was not who she supposed.

“Enough of this,” Tom interrupted, annoyance shadowing his handsome features. “I want us to enjoy our wedding night.”

Her lips parted, as if to argue, but the words were gone before she could give them breath. Instead she smiled up at him, drinking in the haze of emotion rushing through her veins. It was headier than she could remember, augmented by the additional rush that came from feeling Tom’s desire intermingling with her own.

When his lips brushed hers, barely a kiss, but so much more, her eyes rolled back in her head. When his soft lips captured her, his velvet tongue tracing the contours of her mouth, the wetness between her thighs was instant and insistent. When he tore the bloodied scarlet gown from her trembling body and she felt his naked flesh against her own, it was a tidal wave of pleasure, the sensation ricocheting back and forth between them until it reached a fever pitch in her mind. And when he entered her, hips bucking at all the familiar, enticing angles, she was lost, her conscious mind obliterated by the force of his adoration and the raw sensation crackling between them. And then there was the overwhelming love that blanketed her as he brought them both to a fervent consummation of their marriage, their moans and cries echoing far louder than the raging weather beyond.

Tom collapsed beside her, ebony curls plastered against his forehead, sated sigh on his lips. She matched his sigh, maneuvering the duvet and sheets until they were snugly beneath them. His lips brushed against her forehead, a hand tracing idly across her bare shoulder.

“I would not want to have lived a life where I did not find you.”

She felt the truth of the words deep in her marrow, beneath the darkness etched under her skin. Her lips twitched upward in the ghost of a smile. “You have saved me, Tom Riddle. I cannot thank you enough.”

He went still beside her for a long moment before pulling in a deep, shuddering breath. “I only hope that you will continue to feel that way, my dearest wife.”

In light of their recent activities, his doubt made little sense. She twisted toward him, gently brushing a lock of hair from his eye. “I could not imagine a world where I wasn’t in love with you, husband.”

He held her gaze, searching, boyish in his uncertainty. “Whatever you may come to believe, I do love you. I may have started this… with less than honorable intentions, but you’re under my skin, Hermione Riddle. You make me want to be good enough for you, you make me wish I wasn’t…” He shook his head, suddenly turning away. “It doesn’t matter. I can’t change who I am. But know I love you so much that I will remake the world for you and I.”

The shiver that traced the length of her vertebrae didn’t match the declaration of love, feeling instead heavy and dark. She chased the peaceful oblivion of his sapphire eyes, tipping his chin until he looked upon her once more. “I don’t need you to change the world for me.”

“But I will. For both of us. I will never let you go,” he promised, more serious than the marital vows she couldn’t quite recall, the truth of his conviction echoing through her soul. “You are everything now and I will give you everything in return.”

Everything seemed far too much to contemplate, especially safely enveloped within his arms. Hermione sighed, contentment on her lips. Mind heavy, she dropped a kiss on the corner of his full mouth. “Enough talk. I’m exhausted.”

“Indeed,” he sighed, pulling her to his sculpted chest. “Goodnight, wife.”

“Goodnight, husband.”


	24. Twenty Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all again for taking the time to read, comment, kudos or any combination of those three. I am in awe if you even decide to simply read, so thank you. So much of my heart and soul went into writing this (a fact I realize more as I go back and reread to edit as I post), so the fact that each of you has taken the time to delve into something so personal to me is incredible.
> 
> Also I made a cover image for the story using my rudimentary image editing skills, so check that out in the notes for chapter one!
> 
> And now for something completely different...

~*~ Twenty Four ~*~

She awoke to the absence of any warmth, to a bed bereft of her husband. But not to an empty room. There was a figure above her, dark hair falling loose across the angular panes of a familiar face. She blinked, sure her mind must be playing tricks upon her, but Malfoy was still there.

He winced as he sank to kneel beside her. “I apologize in advance, Granger.”

“Wha—”

The word didn’t make it fully out of her throat before the silent _stupefy_ hit her square in the chest and everything faded to cold black.

She was cold again. Frozen like the icicles that hung from the barren trees above her. Trees? She forced her head to turn, taking in the grove of ash and the dying embers of a fire surrounded by a stone circle. Several layers of woolen blankets were piled below and above her, but the biting winter cold still stung her exposed skin.

Hermione shifted, thankful to discover she was wearing a loose blouse and a pair of trousers that seemed close to her size. But what was she doing next to a fire pit in the middle of nowhere? Last she remembered… nothing. No matter how hard she willed herself to put the pieces together, she had no idea where her last location had been, what she had been doing before ending up here, a blanket away from freezing to death.

“Oh, good,” Malfoy’s familiar voice called from across the clearing as he emerged from the forest beyond with an armful of firewood. “You’re awake.”

“What happened?” She pushed herself into a sitting position, wrapping one of the blankets tightly about her shoulders. “And why exactly aren’t we doing any magic to prevent our limbs from freezing off?”

He unceremoniously dumped the firewood beside the glowing embers. “I think you’ll find the answer to the second question has a lot to do with the answer to the first. Although, I believe you have more answers than I do on all counts.”

“I can’t remember shit.”

“Oh, I know.” A dower frown was firmly set on his lips. “I didn’t want you waking up and remembering everything alone.” He ran a hand through his dark hair, disheveling it further. “Best brace yourself, Granger.”

The next second his wand was pointed at her forehead. “ _Legilimens_.”

It was like a dam giving way, a violent explosion followed by an overwhelming flood. Truths ate away half-truths and lies, holes in her timeline became scars, reality collapsed until it was only pain, so acute it stole her breath away. She remembered every stop on her roadmap of horror, every stumble that led to the afternoon in the Riddles’ parlor, every lie Tom had ever told, but also every truth. She felt her soul screaming; she felt his soul beside it.

Wait. She was screaming, a wounded animal in a trap, keening without hope of salvation. Malfoy’s hands were on her shoulders, in her hair, at her damp cheeks. She grabbed hold of him, crushing him into the blankets beside her. He let her. Let her scream and cry until there was nothing left but a darker despair than she had ever known.

When words were finally possible, she croaked, “it’s too late.”

“What?” Malfoy’s stormy eyes were calm for once, but she could feel the rapid tattoo of his heart beneath where her fists tangled in his coat.

“He made… I’m a…” It was impossible to say. It was imperative to say. “He made a Horcrux. Two actually.”

Malfoy’s breath caught now. “Tell me.” The words were monotone, unnaturally controlled.

“Yesterday.” She could barely force the words from her raw throat. “Yesterday we went to Riddle House. Obviously. You found me there. Wait, how did you find me?”

“Aurelia sewed a tracking charm into your dress after you bought it. Then she avoided Riddle like the plague so he couldn’t figure it out. I had to tell her about his abilities as a Legilimens. I’m not sure it was a wise decision since it puts her in significant danger, but it was the only way to make sure I could follow you.” He swiped a hand over his face, jaw working silently, the cost of his choice written across his sharp features.

Hermione swallowed down a surge of bile. “Is she safe?”

“I don’t know.”

That awful truth lay suspended between them for a long moment. “But how did you get me away from him?”

“A detective from the local police force knocked on the manor door just after dawn. They took him down to the station to answer additional questions about his previous statement. I took advantage of the moment. His wards were good, but nowhere near the complexity I’d become accustomed to while working for…” Malfoy’s lips twisted and he shook his head. “Anyway, I was able to dismantle what I needed to and get you away before he came back. I don’t suppose you could tell me what Tom Riddle was doing talking to Muggle cops, could you?”

Hermione nodded, hand clawing through her matted hair. “It all relates to the… Horcruxes. We went to Riddle House for a purpose. The same purpose as when he went in our timeline. Except it was completely different. We got married and—”

“What?” There was no mistaking the absolute horror marring the chiseled panes of his face.

That was the least of it, but she could hardly dismiss the marriage so easily. No, even knowing the full truth now, she understood the wedding had been undeniably real, that Tom’s confession in their marriage bed had been the type of truth that would haunt her until the grave. Lips trembling, she stared across at Malfoy. “I’m married to Tom Riddle. It was real. There was even a Reverend. It wasn’t a magical wedding, but it was a legal Muggle one. We signed our names in the town registry.”

Malfoy’s brow climbed skyward. “You and Tom Riddle had a Muggle wedding?”

“He had a purpose to it.” A very nefarious purpose. “He wanted—needed—the wedding to be real, but it was Muggle because it gave him the opportunity to wipe out the Riddle side of the family without being implicated in their murders and without involving the Gaunt line. He already gave a statement about the murders to the detectives yesterday after… Anyway, I suspect he already murdered his uncle on his mother’s side this time around. He seems to have gone through my knowledge of his life decisions with a fine-toothed comb.”

“Lovely,” Malfoy spat, although it was something they had both suspected in the dress shop in Hogsmeade. “So he got married and then decided to murder everyone but the bride?”

“No, he got married, excused the Reverend, had his father murder his grandparents, then murdered his father and the maid while making two Horcruxes.” It sounded completely fantastical, the plans of a madman. And she supposed Tom was that. She swallowed, bile climbing as she remembered the feeling of the darkness settling into her, of his emotions flooding her as they moved together. “Argh!” She spat toward the embers, metallic tang on her tongue.

“You’re not telling me something important.”

There was no point holding onto the bitter truth. “The two Horcruxes. His wedding band is one and I… I’m the other.”

Malfoy flinched, rocking back from her in the span of a heartbeat. His lips were a hard line as he stared at her, the fire making his eyes more flame than ice now. His voice was a wretched plea as he rasped, “You cannot be serious.”

If only she wasn’t. If only Tom hadn’t figured out what had happened when he’d killed Harry’s parents as Voldemort. If only she couldn’t still feel him within, despite the destruction of his handiwork in her mind. “I am.”

Malfoy sagged back against the blankets, deflating. “Can he tell where you are?” His keen eyes cut through her, searching, trying to understand.

“I’m not sure. When Harry was connected to Voldemort, Voldemort used the link to lure Harry out sometimes, but other times Harry just got impressions that weren’t meant to be shared. Of course, Tom knows exactly what’s happening this time, so I would think he would have significantly more control over our connection. Plus, Tom and I are actually close to each other.” She massaged her temple, digging her fingers in deeply. “We’re bloody legally married.”

“I got rid of everything he’d left in your head,” Malfoy sighed. “But I’m pretty sure it’s going to take more than some serious Legilimency, memory magic or manipulation of the Imperius to get rid of a Horcrux.”

Hermione let out a dark scoff. “Oh, it does. It takes murder.”

Wide, turbulent eyes blinked at her. “Murder?”

“Harry needed to die to get rid of the Horcrux. No one in the Order was ever willing to risk it, so in that last battle the plan was for him to have Voldemort kill him, with the hope it wouldn’t be permanent. But I saw that fall off the parapet. The Killing Curse might not have worked, but that fall certainly did. On the plus side, that was the last Horcrux, unless he’d made new ones. So theoretically he would have been beatable after Harry died.” She hadn’t let herself think about it, not from the moment she’d heard Harry’s lifeless body hit the solid ground. It had been over then. She’d known he wasn’t coming back and a life without him, without anyone she’d loved, had been no life at all.

“But you came here anyway.” Malfoy’s lips pursed, expression inscrutable.

She shrugged, the decision feeling more than a lifetime ago. “With Harry gone, there was no reason to defeat him. No reason to suffer for a world not worth saving.”

He eyed her silently for a long moment before nodding, features dancing in shadow as he turned back to the fire. She took the moment to study him, to truly look at the man beside her, the man who had promised to save her and had followed through. They were hardly safe now, but her mind was her own and that was thanks to him. To Draco Malfoy. To the man whose name had been uttered in the darkest of corners, linked to the most heinous of crimes. The man who had kissed her with the softest of lips and the most tender of caresses in Tom’s bedroom and then silently shook as pain wracked his frame because he was protecting her, waiting for the opportune moment to give her back her sanity. She didn’t understand him, couldn’t understand what went on beyond those tumultuous eyes that somehow made her feel safer than she had since the war began.

He shifted beside her, hands tangling in the blankets idly. “We need to assume the worst. That Riddle can sense where you are, that he can see what you can, know what you know.”

She swallowed around the lump in her throat. He was right. “So what do we do?”

“Do you trust me?”

She wanted to say no. To tell him he was a torture hungry miscreant, but she couldn’t. At some point in the last few months, he’d ceased to be the nightmare of legend and simply become her only ally in a foreign minefield. “Yes.”

His eyes were luminous, equal parts flame and storm as he leaned into her, his wand pressing sharply against her brow. But his words were soft, gentle and calming as he whispered, “We’ll get through this. _Stupefy_.”


	25. Twenty Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your continued support. You are the best readers an author could hope for. Seriously. If you haven't already, check out the cover I made for the story in the notes at the beginning. I'm no photoshop guru, but it was the first time I'd made art for one of my pieces and it was fun to do.

~*~ Twenty Five ~*~

When she next pushed through the dark fog, it was daylight and they were at the bank of a stream, its frigid water rushing past under a thin veneer of ice. Hermione couldn’t tell where they were and supposed that was half the point. She was atop the pile of blankets again while Malfoy spun a small spit with an unknown animal on it, his back to her. She blinked several times, adjusting to the frosty daylight and the chill in her lungs.

When she was finally able to speak, she murmured, “How long?”

He turned his head, scanning her from head to toe before answering. “Several days.”

Hermione supposed that made sense. If they were trying to escape Tom’s ability to track her, it was better to keep her under as much as possible. That didn’t mean there wasn’t the chill of dread in her bones at the thought of being utterly helpless as he chose their path. “You levitating me?”

“Sometimes.” He shrugged. “Honestly I try to avoid using any magic. You never know who’s out there. Mostly I just carry you.”

Her heart did an odd jump. “Like a Muggle?”

Malfoy rolled his eyes at her. “Like a bloody human being, Granger.”

Right. She kept forgetting he wasn’t the boy she’d known. Although now that they were away from the castle and its herb garden, his hair was fading, the midnight now a muddy brown and the roots clearly showing hints of platinum blond. She wasn’t sure she wanted the dye to go away. It was easier to separate him from the boy of her memories when he was all dark brows and inky fringe. Easier to acknowledge how very much she needed him, how much she had come to trust him.

“You’re staring, Granger.” He didn’t seem particularly put out, but if she’d learned anything, it was the man had a poker face to envy.

“Sorry,” she muttered, adjusting her focus to the spit in front of him. “What’s for lunch?”

“Squirrel,” he replied dryly. He cast a frown over his shoulder. “You know you don’t have to do that.”

“What?” She wasn’t doing anything other than looking at the meat on the spit.

Malfoy sighed, running his free hand through his disheveled hair. “The way you are with men. It isn’t necessary. Not everything is about sexual attraction.”

Hermione blinked, unsure if she should be intrigued or offended. “What are you talking about, Malfoy?”

“Look, I know it’s none of my business, but I’m bloody tired of holding my tongue and it looks like we’re stuck with each other for awhile longer.” He paused, rotating the squirrel. “I know we all have different ways of coping with the hell we go through. Merlin knowns I’m screwed up a million ways from Sunday. But, Granger… Hermione, your worth isn’t determined by getting men to take you to bed.”

She stared at him, at the eyes full of sorrow and something deeper, at the clench of his jaw, and simply frowned. “I don’t know what you’re trying to say. I don’t—”

“You do. When we first came here, I was expecting to contend with the spitfire I’d known in school, the girl who punched me in the face. Instead you spent the first few days staring at me and Riddle like you wanted to eat us for lunch. Eventually you started staring more at him and less at me, but that’s not the point. The point is that you’d just gotten out of a warzone and your first instinct was to find someone to shag you.”

He looked less pleased to be saying the words than she felt hearing them. He’d told her this before, during their conversations in the shadows of Hogwarts, but her mind hadn’t been entirely her own then and the truth of them not fallen quite so sharply. Now she realized with a sick churn of her stomach that he was right, as he had always been. Although she wasn’t sure why he continued to harp on a topic that had brought nothing but ire between them. “It was a way to forget the pain.”

“With Potter, sure,” he conceded. “But not with me or Riddle. Not when I was your enemy and he was the one you intended to kill. Even if Riddle did get in your head so quickly, you still wanted him, wanted what he was doing to you. What happened to you, Hermione?”

A sudden rush of anger tore through her. What right did he have to judge her, to find her lacking when he was guilty of so much more? “Fuck you, Malfoy. You’re no bloody angel either.”

He took the spit off the fire, setting the meat aside with a nonchalance that grated at her. “I never said I was. But there are also a number of reasons for my choices. Reasons that, I’d like to believe, explain my actions. Not justify, to be clear, but explain.”

“Why should I tell you anything when you’ve told me nothing?” Not that she even had an answer, her urge for physical connection another effect of wartime trauma she could not fully explain. That Tom had seemed to erase the ache completely by their wedding night was something she wasn’t ready to acknowledge.

“You know about my cursed leg.”

That was it. She knew nothing else about him except he was willing to risk his life for her now. And that perhaps his relationship with Voldemort was not as simple as it had once seemed. “You’ve been in my head on countless occasions, Malfoy. I have no secrets left from you. But you, you only have secrets.”

“Fine,” he murmured, tearing the meat apart and offering her half. “You’re not the only one here who has been married.”

She took the offering, fingers closing numbly around the charred flesh. It took two full breaths to quell the disbelief his statement had wrought. Malfoy married? It seemed absurd, but she could see the truth in his haunted eyes, in the tension distorting his angular features.

“When?”

He almost concealed his flinch from her, but she saw the sudden tic of his jaw, the grind of his teeth. “If you count the last six months, three years about.”

Hermione gaped. “You were so young.”

He shrugged, a look passing across his features that broke her heart. “We were in love.”

“What happened?”

Malfoy chewed silently on his meat for some minutes before murmuring, nearly too softly to hear, “She died.”

Hermione rocked back, the quiet words hitting like daggers. She’d assumed… wrong. That much was painfully clear. All those times Malfoy had looked at her with sorrow in his eyes she’d never imagined it could be the product of such a profound loss. She wondered who the girl had been, how she had met her untimely end, but knew better than to ask. That night in the library, when Riddle had finally dug his talons deep inside her pliable mind, Malfoy had mentioned something about a girl dying for nothing if he gave up. It was now clear that girl had been his wife.

She could hardly imagine losing someone so dear to her as a spouse. Sure, she was technically married to Tom and she would be lying if she claimed there was no emotion tying her to him even after she’d escaped his cognitive manipulations, but she wasn’t in love with him. Perhaps she still cared for some parts of him, the facets of his soul that were not so swathed in shadow as to be inhuman, but she would not fight for him, would not place him before herself ever again. The closest she came was the tender love she’d shared with Ron, but she could hardly remember those emotions, so buried between grief and pain they were.

“I’m so sorry.”

Malfoy nodded once, stiffly, and turned away. “We all have scars, Granger.”

They didn’t speak for a long time after that and Hermione welcomed the oblivion that came with the next _stupefy_.


	26. Twenty Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for being awesome. I hope you're well and safe.

~*~ Twenty Six ~*~

It felt like she was under water, drowning and floating, fighting yet serene. It was everything at once and nothing at all. And yet she was not alone in the silky darkness that caressed her every nerve, saturating her completely. She could feel him, could feel the ravenous hunger and unfettered desire as if they were her own. And yet there was no up or down, no orientation in the night that sagged in upon her.

_Precious._ He spoke and yet it was not aloud, it was in the very fiber of her being, the lost depths of her broken soul.

She turned a circle in the midst of nowhere, searching for him, knowing he was far beyond her reach. “You’re not real.”

His dark chuckle sent an echo of a shiver down her spine, a memory of another time, another person. _I’m real. Don’t be so naïve, my dearest wife. I’m simply not there. But we are never far apart, not truly._

A tremor rattled through her, all too real. He was in her, some ravaged fraction of his soul abutting hers. She closed her eyes, but it was the same infinite void as when they’d been open. Wherever they were, it wasn’t physical.

“What do you want, Tom?”

Hermione swore she could feel his breath on her neck, searing into her skin, as he answered. _I want my wife back. I promised you everything and now you’re running from me. I can sense you, my dearest wife. I know you haven’t gotten far even if the Malfoy spawn is helping you._

“I’m not yours to have, Tom,” she hissed into the abyss. “I was never yours. You only made me think I was. You took my will, my sanity, and you used me. No matter how you truly feel about me, if you even bother trying to atone, I will never forgive you for that. I remember everything now, every time you pushed my mind to accept what you wanted, every time you took my body without my permission.”

He sighed, a rasp in the gluttonous night, at once real and illusory. _You will always be mine. I never made you feel anything that wasn’t already inside of your head. I never made you do anything you didn’t already crave. When I first saw inside your mind, you already wanted me. We hadn’t even met and you were wondering what my lips would taste like on yours. So despite your designs to kill me, I gave you what you craved. You’ve always liked what I gave you, my dearest wife. You need me. And now I love you more than anyone else ever could. You are mine, but I am also yours._

There was a truth in his words that haunted her, that tore at her confidence and tempted her to doubt. But she wasn’t the same person she’d been, turning to Tom to ease the unrelenting ache of darkness in her soul, running from pain for so long she had no idea how to stop. She’d survived Tom’s sordid manipulations and now she’d been given a glimpse of true freedom, not the momentary relief she’d found in his arms. It was an opportunity she would not waste.

“You took my agency, Tom. I don’t care how much my body wanted what you did or how much I actually might have liked you. It was my right to decide what I wanted. Not yours. You made Malfoy watch, for Merlin’s sake. I didn’t want that. I know I didn’t. You used me like a tool to solidify your power over him. That’s not the way you treat someone you love. And you sure as Hell don’t own me. I am not and will never be yours.”

_Bold words for a girl who gave up her integrity, her entire purpose, at the drop of a hat to escape her demons. I didn’t do a single thing to your head in the hallway after our duel. You chose to kiss me entirely of your own free will, my dearest wife. Then you kept coming back for more, knowing exactly who I was, what I was capable of. You knew and you still chose me. You’ll always choose me._ There was a certainty in his statement that rent her, that reminded her how true his every word was. Until his conclusion.

“I may have kissed you, but I never truly chose you. You never let me. Whatever I wanted, it was influenced by you. You took away my fear, my doubts, my ability to think rationally. Who knows, Tom, I might actually have pursued you, but we’ll never know because you took that away from me. You gave up any real chance you might have had with me when you took away my ability to decide for myself. You never gave me the chance and now, when I’m free to do as I please, I promise, I will never choose you.” Hermione smiled into the void, satisfaction thrumming through her. It felt good to fight back, to stand up for herself to the boy who had stripped her of everything.

_I will not let you be taken from me. You are my wife and I will find you and return you to your rightful place at my side. I will burn the world until I find you if that’s what it takes._

She could feel his rage, quiet, but slowly building with each refusal, his mounting frustration struggling with his twisted notion of love and desire. Good. Let him suffer, let him know what it was to be denied. “Go to Hell, Tom.”

_Not without you, dearest wife._ The saccharine caress was back in his voice, his emotions under control again. _Now tell me, where are you?_

“I don’t know.” And she really didn’t. Malfoy had made sure of that. They’d been travelling for a little over a fortnight, but she had no idea where they were or what direction they moved. He’d been careful to only wake her when necessary, for sustenance and sleep. Otherwise she traveled at his whim, trusting him to find a way to save them both, if only for another night.

She could feel Tom’s distress rattle through her as his control snapped, his snarled words a roar in her head. _You will tell me where you are._

There was compulsion behind his demand, a tug at her mind that had her thankful for Malfoy’s abundance of caution. “I really don’t know.”

There was only a moment of twisted rage, boiling through her, before the agony hit full force, a tidal wave of pain flooding her every sense. It boiled her blood and frayed her nerves, vivisected her organs and set fire to her soul. It was a perverse poison coiling through her heart, shredding her lungs and taking away her breath in a single moment. And then it was gone as quickly as it had come, the tang of regret lingering in the heavy, not-quite air.

Tom’s cry was softer than satin, laden with remorse. _Hermione… Oh, Salazar, Hermione._

“Hermione!” Tom’s tone morphed, his words suddenly harsher, more real. “Damnit, Hermione. Bloody wake up!”

There was a splash of icy water across her face and then she was shooting upward, breath heaving in uncontrolled pants. Icy drops fell from her lashes as she blinked her eyes open, meeting the stormy stare of Draco Malfoy. Malfoy, not Tom. Safe.

She gasped in another handful of breaths. “What happened?”

“You just started twitching. It looked like you were trying to say something, but your mouth just opened and closed, no words came out.” Malfoy shot her a severe frown before he continued. “And then your whole body convulsed, like you were under the Cruciatus. I tried to wake you, but it seems only the canteen in the face did the trick.”

“Tom,” she breathed, voice ragged. “It was Tom. He was trying to figure out where we were.”

Malfoy shifted, growling, “Riddle?”

Hermione nodded, the magnitude of what had just happened settling over her. “He talked to me. He’s figured out how to use the connection between us.”

His lips twisted into a familiar sneer. “Of course he has.” Malfoy kicked a nearby stump, his boot connecting with a dull thud.

“This is the reason Dumbledore had Snape teach Harry Occlumency. To protect his mind from the link to Voldemort. Of course, that means the old man knew Harry was a Horcrux and never bothered to warn him of what was coming.” She sighed. “But I suppose that’s neither here nor there now.”

Malfoy leaned back against a pine, arms crossed and expression inscrutable. His coat pulled tightly across his shoulders and she was reminded how much broader he was now, how much more of a force to be reckoned with he had become. “Our last foray into Occlumency training yielded stunningly terrible results including your marriage to a madman.”

“I didn’t trust you and he was taking advantage of my blackouts.”

He raised a brow. “While I appreciate the sentiment, Granger, it takes more than simply trusting me to do this. You have to truly want to succeed and not just in an academic, surface level sort of way. And you have to stop losing time. I know it isn’t something you can directly control, but maybe if you’re in a more stable environment we can find ways to prevent it.”

“He just tortured me from a distance, Malfoy. Believe me, I have no choice but to succeed. And I think the blackouts are a result of the trauma, of not having anyone to trust, or a safe place to sleep, not having my basic needs met.” She swallowed, throat suddenly dry. “But I feel… safe with you.”

He blinked at her. “Oh. That’s good then.” He shook his head, and stared out at the multitude of frosty trees, lips pressing into a grim line. “The amount of power, the strength of the connection between you two. It’s completely unnatural. The only other links I’ve ever heard of that has that type of power are various mating or wedding bindings. All long out of date and generally used to subjugate one of the partners.”

That was unsettling on a whole different level than Horcruxes side effects. Her pulse hammered against her temple as she stared up at Malfoy, searching his troubled features. “What exactly are you trying to say?”

“There’s a significant chance the Horcrux isn’t the only thing binding you to Riddle.” Malfoy sank into a seat at the base of the tree, elbows resting on his knees, focus never wavering from Hermione. “What else happened that day? Besides the creation of the Horcruxes?”

“We got married and… and we had our wedding night.” Just remembering the fusion of their desires, the heady depths of pleasure had Hermione blushing.

Malfoy cleared his throat, but she could feel the prickle of his continued examination. “Anything unusual about the wedding night?”

“I wouldn’t know,” she snapped, pointedly refusing to look in his direction. “It’s not like I’ve been married before.”

He sighed, long and deep. “I suppose not. From what I recall of mine, it felt different than before, with the commitment between the two of us made formal. But it wasn’t like there was suddenly a new connection between us, simply that the connection that had always been there was deeper.”

That made sense. That was nothing like what had happened that night in Riddle House. “I assumed it was the Horcrux. I could feel the piece of him in me, but I could also feel every single one of his carnal desires like they were my own. It was the most connected I’ve ever felt to anybody.”

And wasn’t that the horrible truth. Even knowing exactly what Tom had done to her, a part of her yearned for the depth of that connection, the absolute security she’d felt blanked in him, mind, body and soul. It made her hate him; it made her wish he was here. Hermione swallowed, bile thick on her tongue at the realization.

Malfoy was at her side in an instant, gloved hands holding back her hair as she wretched onto the forest floor, shoulders trembling and mind cracking. Her cheeks were wet, chilled by the stiff breeze. Her throat was raw as she collapsed against Malfoy, resting against his chest as he drew his arms gently around her.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

His grip on her tightened a fraction, his breath a welcome warmth at her neck. “You have nothing to be sorry about. None of this is your fault. He did this to you, Hermione.”

“You said I shouldn’t have been so willing to let him use me. That I shouldn’t have looked at either of you like that. And you were right.” It took nearly all her energy to force the words out, to unearth the ugly truth she’d been fighting. “My weakness, my need to connect physically, that’s what caused this. It’s my fault.”

“No,” he said firmly. “No. I was an idiot. I only meant to tell you I was worried about your attitude toward sex. I was in no way implying that you caused Riddle to take the liberties he did. You did not. We both know that the minute you looked at him the Great Hall, he had his hooks in you. That means he was influencing you from the very first moment you met. He likely had even divined your intent to kill and decided to have a little fun first. Of course, I don’t think he planned to fall for you.”

“He didn’t,” she affirmed, relaxing into the warmth of Malfoy’s embrace. “He told me on our wedding night he didn’t mean to love me, but that he did. Merlin knows why.”

There was a long silence with only the murmur of the forest—the distant call of a hawk, the squeak of a rodent—to fill the space. Finally Malfoy shifted until Hermione had no choice but to meet those tumultuous eyes. He was canted over her, her head nearly resting in his lap now. “You’re so much stronger, more powerful, than you think, Hermione Granger. Riddle is drawn to powerful things. It’s little wonder he wanted you. Your entire world has been stripped away and yet you’re still fighting. That’s true strength.”

Hermione frowned, unable to believe him. “I don’t feel strong.”

“You don’t have to.”

She let her head fall back to rest on his thigh, but the hiss that escaped his lips had her shooting upright. “Shit. Sorry.”

He tried to smile around a grimace. “It’s okay.”

“It’s really not. You’ve been carrying me through the forest with a leg that doesn’t even work properly and I haven’t even remembered that’s got to be terrible for you.” That guilt, on top of her certainty that Tom wouldn’t have been half as successful if she hadn’t been a willing conquest, made her stomach drop and the urge to vomit return.

“My leg works just fine, Granger,” Malfoy bit out, clearly still recovering. “It just hurts like bloody hell. There is a difference.”

Hermione crawled across the frozen ground, twigs and needles digging through her gloves as she maneuvered to slump beside Malfoy where he sat stiffly against a fallen log. “Some pair we make.”

“Bloody disasters.”

“So when do we start Occlumency again?”

He rolled his head to glower at her, stormy eyes crisscrossed with pain. “Give me five minutes.”


	27. Twenty Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your continued support and kind words. As we move forward there are a couple of things to address. 
> 
> First, I have only ever seen and read the original Harry Potter series, not any of the subsequent movies, etc. Blasphemous, I know. It's just these stories are so ingrained in my childhood and coming of age nostalgia that I can't imagine exposing myself to anything else. That means that my depictions of Gellert Grindelwald are based on the brief descriptions in the books, the images I've seen from the recent movies and a large dash of my own creativity. So please view his character accordingly.
> 
> Also, the French Resistance was very active during this time (late March 1944, currently in the story). They played a significant role in disrupting German rail routes and passing key information to The Allies in preparation for Operation Overlord (D-Day, June 6th 1944). Thus, Hermione and Draco are traveling through a very active war zone that included much guerilla-style warfare. While they mostly stick to the wizarding side of the war in this story, the final push of Allied forces into France and beyond does play out in the background (although I do not often specifically address it).
> 
> Okay, I think that's it for now. I hope each and every one of you is staying safe and well.

~*~ Twenty Seven ~*~

One month, a lifetime worth of Occlumency practice and several countries later, Hermione and Malfoy stood at the edge of Grenoble, France, surveying the rise of the Alps surrounding them. It hadn’t been an easy journey, travelling through a Muggle war zone, attempting to avoid magic unless absolutely necessary. German troops had only recently begun their occupation of Grenoble and the Resistance was still in full force within the city and its surrounding vales. Of course, while the machinations of the Muggle war were important to be cognizant of, they were not the reason Hermione and Malfoy now stood a continent away from Hogwarts. No, that would be Grindelwald.

It had taken two weeks of intensive Occlumency for Hermione to finally have a worthy shield in place at all times. It had been easier this time, without Tom’s deeply seated claws messing with her perception, but it had been far from straightforward. Only Malfoy’s iron-clad understanding of what was necessary and her desperation to be free had propelled her to success on such an expedited timetable. Even so, she was years away from Malfoy’s abilities. But he’d assured her it would be enough, especially since whatever bond they were trying to close off seemed weakened by distance. The further they’d traveled from Britain, the more they’d heard the mortars, seen the dog fights in the sky, the quieter Tom’s voice in her head had become. By the time they’d reached the continent, the combination of her shield and the distance had silenced him completely.

Only after she’d stopped sensing anything beyond the fragment of his soul, an unctuous black stain upon her own, had Malfoy ceased to knock her out. It was then he’d revealed their destination. They were going to find Grindelwald and then they were going to convince him to destroy Tom. It sounded simple enough, but Hermione had no idea why Grindelwald would deign to help them. He was in the middle of the Global Wizarding War, forced into hiding, but still fighting to eradicate the Statute of Secrecy and bring about a world order where Muggles bowed at the feet of their magical superiors, a world she was very much not interested in seeing come to fruition. But Malfoy seemed unerringly sure that Grindelwald would accommodate their desire to eliminate Tom.

So here they stood, mere miles from Grindelwald’s last known location, the scars of war inescapable every direction she looked. Malfoy pointed toward the nearest valley, determination steeling his jaw. His hair was a dirty blond now, more from the filth of their journey than the remnants of the dye. Indeed, he looked very much like himself again, which made a tendril of unease stir within her every time she caught sight of him. There was no more pretending he was someone other than the boy she’d grown up with, the man she’d fought against, the monster she’d heard too much about.

Despite the nearly six weeks on the road together, Hermione was no closer to reconciling the man she’d come to know with the gruesome stories passed between members of the Order. He never spoke about the war years if he could help it and when pressed he often clammed up immediately, warning only that things were not always as they seemed. By this point, Hermione was more than aware of that. She, Hermione Granger, heroine of the Order, had fallen for the manipulations of the enemy with a smile on her face. If she was no angel, and she knew she wasn’t, then perhaps he was no devil either. But she wished he would talk to her, to let her understand more beyond the pain in his leg and the loss of his wife. He was so close to becoming human, to becoming a friend, and yet he maintained the distance between them, leaving her with insidious guilt and no outlet to fully articulate the struggle that raged within. So they traveled in silence, her mistakes etching misery upon her soul, Occlumency the only link tying them together.

Hermione’s breath was ragged by the time they made it into the glen, the sun sinking low in the late March sky. It was still frigid at these elevations, despite the recent equinox, and she shivered beneath her heavy parka. Malfoy didn’t let up on their grueling pace as he strode across the hewn fields, heading for the dimly lit farmhouse in the distance. Hermione could barely make out the structure in the dying light, the shadows of the ominous peaks already casting darkness over the valley. Her breath was visible, clouds of frost clinging to her skin with every pant. She could barely feel the tips of her fingers and was thankful for the ever-increasing size of the house in the distance. It had been too long since she’d had a wall between her and the elements, even if magic had helped keep her warm when mere Muggle solutions could not.

“Do we have a plan?” she hissed under her breath, realizing they’d never talked about exactly what to say to gain entrance to Grindelwald’s domain.

“Keep your shield up. Do not let it waver, not even for the slightest moment. If you feel an attack, direct it appropriately,” he cautioned, not looking away from the house, which upon closer inspection was more a manor the size of Riddle House than a mere country farmhouse. “Leave the rest to me. Don’t speak unless absolutely necessary.”

The thought of letting Malfoy take the lead left her feeling decidedly uneasy, but she’d stopped doubting her trust in him several hundred miles back. Taking a deep breath, the icy air burning down her throat, she began fully assembling her Occlumency shielding. While she had learned to always be on guard against the invasion of her mind from internal forces, namely Tom and his still unidentified binding to her, she had to focus to assemble the full protection needed to thwart an external foe. As each layer of defense settled around her, she took another breath, timing the construction to the steady rise and fall of her lungs. It had been Malfoy’s idea to take a simple concept, such as breathing, and use it as the framework of her shield assembly. Hermione had to admit it did help ground the process and make it feel more like donning a suit of armor than some abstract construction only present in her very cluttered mind.

Malfoy’s hand clamped on her arm brought reality staggering back into focus, her shield assembled. She squinted into the dusk, identifying the movement Malfoy must have sensed. Her wand fell silently to her hand, but she didn’t draw it completely, letting him lead. His grip loosened on her arm, but didn’t release.

“Identify yourselves,” a cool voice traversed the darkness, genderless and calm.

“I’m Draco Malfoy and this is my companion, Hermione Granger. I come with tidings of the future to speak with Gellert Grindelwald.”

Hermione barely kept her gasp in check, fighting every instinct to stare a hole in Malfoy’s blond head. He’d been so adamant about not letting Tom know they had such knowledge, but here he was petitioning for Grindelwald’s help using the same damning information. There was no reply from their interceptor, but she could hear formless whispers floating like wisps of smoke across the field for some minutes. Malfoy didn’t waver, didn’t look away from the spot where they’d seen the shadow emerge and then retreat.

Hermione released the breath she hadn’t known she was holding, doing her best to calm the raging thunder of her heart within her chest. She’d been in worse spots, faced far worse odds on the battlefield and walked away. But this was different. For the first time in years, she was mostly lucid, and beyond that, she cared if she lived or died. It was a wholly unwelcome realization. She’d been reckless and lost for so long, numb to the risks, dulled by the steady flow of blood, that she’d forgotten the acrid tang of fear on her tongue and the nauseating realization that despite her will to live, survival was no guarantee.

“Steady,” Malfoy muttered, guttural and deep, and just what she needed to take another calming breath.

A moment later a new voice crackled across the void. “Mr. Malfoy. I hear you wish to speak with me about a great many things.”

Malfoy’s breath caught, a sharp rasp in the night, but when he spoke, his tone was detached, calm to the point of near insolence. “I may. It depends on whether you are willing to negotiate for such a conversation.”

The dark chuckle from across the field was every bit as unnerving as her memory of Voldemort’s high pitched laugh, equal parts broken glass and veiled poison. “I like you already, my boy. Come, come, you and your… companion must be cold and tired after your journey.”

Malfoy’s grip slipped to her hand as he stepped forward, crossing the distance. The man who greeted them was flanked by two others shrouded in black cloaks, only the gleam of their eyes visible beneath the hoods. Unlike his companions, the man in the middle wore only charcoal trousers tucked into knee-high black boots and a loose cotton shirt, rolled up the elbows and buttoned down the front. It was black, but luminous in a way that told Hermione it must be silken or some sort of other expensive fabric. His hair was a platinum blond that stuck out in an ordered chaos from his scalp, his jaw square and eyes sharp beneath a broad brow. His stare was like a piercing arrow to the chest, a near physical blow as he studied each of them in turn.

Hermione could feel the precise moment he tested her shield, but when she resisted easily, he didn’t attempt to pry further. If anything, his eyes gleamed just a hair brighter in the rising moonlight.

“How very curious you are indeed,” he murmured, then shook his head, a biting smiling that raised all her hackles plastering on his thin lips. “Now where are my manners? I am Gellert Grindelwald and I am very pleased to welcome you to my humble abode of the hour. Do join me for supper?”

It wasn’t a request. Malfoy nodded amiably, stormy eyes bereft of the slightest trace of emotion. “Of course, my Lord.”

Grindelwald’s lips twitched. “Such good manners. Yes, I am going to enjoy this conversation, Mr. Malfoy.”

Malfoy merely bowed his head in deference as Grindelwald led the way to the manor dining room. A chandelier with at least a hundred candles towered over the table, casting the room in a warm, ethereal glow. Two additional plates appeared on the table with a wave of his wand and he motioned for them to sit on either side of his place at the head of the table. The cloaked men faded back, blending seamlessly with the shadowed recesses of the room. Malfoy sank into place without so much as a blink. Hermione followed a half second behind, nerves fraying as she surreptitiously studied the second most powerful dark wizard their world had known. Of course, Tom had yet to become Voldemort, so perhaps he was indeed the most powerful, most deadly there would ever be.

Grindelwald was everything and nothing like she’d pictured. He was younger, but that made sense; he was only in his sixties now, thus appearing only vaguely middle-aged by Muggle standards. His grey-blue eyes were less flinty than she’d expected, his whole face softer than a mass-murderer’s had any right to be. But even Tom still looked like a fallen angel after slaughtering his family and splitting his soul. It was unsettling to understand death and destruction could be hidden behind such alluring visages. It was only the oily edge to his smile, the brittle pitch to his deep voice and the harsh edges of his laugh that told her this was not a man to trust.

Their host took a large swig of whatever alcohol resided in his goblet before narrowing eyes at Malfoy. “So how far into the future do you hail?”

“Far enough to know your defeat and your death.” Malfoy smiled, razor sharp. “And I come with the offer to deliver the man who would kill you. But only if his death is on my terms.”

Hermione went rigid for a moment, the pieces suddenly slamming together. Voldemort had killed Grindelwald in Nurmengard during his search for the Elder wand. While the Hallows had eventually been united during the first year of the war, they’d been no help in destroying Voldemort or his Death Eaters and Harry had rehidden the wand in Ron’s tomb after recovering it from Malfoy during a battlefield skirmish that had degenerated into a fist fight, leaving Harry with a broken nose and dislocated jaw. Her gaze slid to Malfoy. Did he realize what he’d had in his possession? Did he know bringing Tom here would be opening up the possibility of him learning of the Hallows, if he didn’t know already? It was a risk she wouldn’t take, but Malfoy might not even be aware of it. Unfortunately, she could do little to inform him now.

Trying to keep her expression as neutral as possible, she shifted to consider Grindelwald. His nostrils flared the slightest bit as he digested Malfoy’s words, but otherwise he showed no sign of distress at their knowledge of his death and defeat.

“Such a promise cannot be fulfilled without a price. After all, I do need to know you are telling the truth. I could be crude and force Veritaserum down your throats, but that’s entirely uncivilized and I find true loyalty more effective anyway.” He clasped his hands together, a cruel echo of an excited child on Christmas morning. “So here’s now it will go, Mr. Malfoy, Miss Granger. I will have my truth and my murderer, but I will also have you.”

Malfoy’s brow raised. “I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

“You and Miss Granger will join my ranks. You will fight for me, lead and train my troops with your… specialized knowledge. Only after you have served me and given me what I need on the battlefront will I seek out my killer and bring him to you.” His smile cut her to the bone, as if his teeth were truly sinking into her flesh. “I will, of course, require the name of my would-be murderer before I enter into this agreement. One can never be too cautious with these sorts of things.”

Going back out there. Back to the blood and the dirt and the death. It was like asking her to hold her hand on a searing cauldron; she could not do it. Her very psyche, the parts of her left unshattered, rebelled against such a vile idea. And yet Malfoy said, “Agreed.”

“The name?”

“Tom Marvolo Riddle.” It was her voice that cut like diamond across the table. Her words that condemned them all.


	28. Twenty Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Each and every one of you is still the best. I appreciate you so much if you leave a note, drop a kudos or simply just read. All of those are equally wonderful. We are finally getting to the portion of the narrative where Draco's story begins to come fully into focus and I'm so excited for all of you to experience the growth and evolution of his relationship with Hermione. For those of you who really like Tom, have no fear, we have definitely not seen the last of him either.

~*~ Twenty Eight ~*~

Their room was sparse. Two cots pushed to opposite sides of the room and a water closet attached to the far wall. There was a single window with not even a ledge, simply a shear drop, the dull gray stone of the manor impossible to scale. They were not prisoners in name, but in all that truly mattered they clearly were.

Malfoy’s head canted to the side, turbulent eyes sliding to the door. “Go to the washroom. Now.”

On another day, in another life, she would have questioned him. Now she simply slid the door closed, studying the empty bath and rudimentary toilet. A flick of her wand had the bath filling with steaming water. A moment later she’d freed her feet from the heavy boots and deposited her socks within them. Her aching feet were in the water seconds later, a moan of pleasure barely suppressed on her lips. It had been too long since she’d had the luxury of warm water and she was bone weary. If Malfoy hadn’t been in the next room, she would have flung the rest of her clothes aside as well and fully immersed in the steaming tub. As it was, something had set him on edge and she had no intention of being caught naked and unaware.

The source of his unease was identified a moment later, Grindelwald’s jagged voice sounding in the room beyond.

“All alone? Where is your…?”

“Companion.” Malfoy replied curtly. “Taking a bath.”

There was a whispered muffling spell that Hermione easily undid with a wave of her own wand. She was not missing this conversation. Malfoy was leaving her out of the loop for a reason, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t owed an explanation. She might trust him with her life now, but their debt to Grindelwald was one she would bear in equal measure. If she was going to put herself through total hell again, she deserved to know the finer details.

She could hear shuffling on the other side of the door, a scuff of a shoe on the stone floor and then the squeak of a mattress as someone sat.

“So tell me, boy, what has this Tom Riddle done to make you orchestrate his demise?” Grindelwald didn’t sound terribly interested in the answer, but Hermione doubted he was truly so removed from learning more about the man who would kill him.

The sound of footsteps echoed dully in the other room for several long moments. Malfoy. Grindelwald must have taken a seat while Malfoy paced the length of the room. The movement stopped and Malfoy finally answered. “He wronged someone very dear to me.”

Hermione’s breath caught. He couldn’t be talking about her, could he? Grindelwald seemed to share the same conception as he asked, “Your companion?”

Malfoy’s response was sharp, his voice harder than usual. “No, my wife.”

Oh. Whatever Tom had done to Hermione must not hold a candle to what Voldemort had done to his wife. Had he killed her? Malfoy had admitted she died, perhaps this was how. Or had it been far worse than that? Malfoy might have been Voldemort’s primary means of torture and pain, but Hermione knew the monster had been fully capable of doing his own dirty work. It turned her stomach to imagine Malfoy watching his wife writhe on the ground, the effects of the Cruciatus wracking her every limb. Her fingers closed into fists, nails digging into the pliable skin of her palms.

“And your relationship to this Riddle fellow?” Grindelwald paused a moment, as if surveying Malfoy. “What might that have been?”

“I was his right-hand man. After my aunt passed, he needed someone he could trust to fulfill his every whim. He chose me.” There wasn’t an iota of emotion behind the statement, the words cold and stale.

“Ah,” Grindelwald murmured, barely audible through the door separating them. “So you administered his will.”

“Yes.”

“Death?”

“On a daily basis for nearly two and a half years.” There was a jolt in her chest that was altogether painful and unwelcome. She’d known. She’d known, but she’d tried her very best to forget.

“Torture?”

“At equal frequency, if not more often. The Dark Lord found it easier to maintain order in his ranks through fear rather than respect. I was just as likely to have my wand on an enemy as a friend.” Again, it was nothing she hadn’t already known, but to hear it, to hear that voice, so flat and dead now, telling such gruesome truths. It hurt. It hurt so much she wasn’t sure she could bear the ache that went bone deep and cut into her soul. She wished Grindelwald would stop asking questions, strop forcing truths she didn’t want to hear.

But he didn’t. “And information gathering?”

“You mean torture for information?” The question held no hint of curiosity, only a bland interest in determining the nature of his companion’s inquiry.

“Yes.”

She could almost see Malfoy shrug, all insolent nonchalance. “Occasionally. The Dark Lord was not overly interested in the peculiarities of battle. He’d long since lost his higher reasoning skills.”

“You mean to say he’d gone mad?” Now Grindelwald was interested.

“Oh yes. Utterly. He was a terrible leader. The only reason he won the war was the raw dark power he’d amassed. Without it he would have been nothing more than a bumbling idiot.” Hermione was surprised by the assessment, but realized he spoke the truth. Voldemort had split his soul five more times than Tom had. Then he’d spent over a decade as an incorporeal spirit without a host. He’d been significantly less than human by the time he’d been fully restored in that graveyard their fourth year.

“And the Riddle you plan for me to deliver?”

There was a sharp laugh—Malfoy’s—that stung her ears. “Oh, he’s plenty sane. Has yet to destroy his psyche in its entirety. He may have mad designs, but he is fully capable of following through on them. Unlike the man I served, he is a formidable enemy to you.”

“Why travel back to a point where your enemy was more powerful? Why not move against him sooner if he was so weak in your time?” Considering it hadn’t been Malfoy’s idea to come to the past at all, she wondered how he would answer. He’d clearly wished harm upon Voldemort even before lacing the time turner’s chain about his neck. But he hadn’t been militant about it, certainly hadn’t supported her initial decision to kill the younger version of the monster to be.

“Sometimes the opportune moment is the last thing you might suspect,” Malfoy evaded coolly. “But to answer your second question, I was not in a position where I could move against him without great harm being done.”

The mattress creaked under Grindelwald as he divined Malfoy’s unspoken admission. “Your wife.”

“Yes, my Lord.”

Hermione’s nails dug suddenly deeper into her palms, the truth a shot of ice water to her veins. It would explain everything. His choices, the allusion to a reason he wouldn’t explain. Much like sixth year when Voldemort had held his mother over him—a fact divined from Snape before he died a traitor at Malfoy’s hands the second year of the war—Voldemort had used Malfoy’s attachments against him. Hermione gagged as quietly as she could, the rotten truth of the matter burning her throat. He’d been used, made to do everything the Order had reported, because his wife had been at Voldemort’s mercy. No wonder he was so closed off, unwilling to trust, sure the world was against him at every turn. No wonder he sneered down his nose at her, her wartime troubles child’s play compared to the horror he’d endured. She’d always found the scorn confusing, the anger misplaced, but no longer. She’d lost her friends. He’d perpetrated atrocities to save the one he loved. There really was no comparison.

Malfoy and Grindelwald were still speaking, something about the particularities of what the elder wanted them to accomplish in his ranks, but Hermione was done listening. All she could hear was Malfoy’s dead tone as he agreed with Grindelwald’s conclusion, as he admitted the magnitude of the ordeal he’d withstood. She hadn’t been able to see him, hadn’t watched the sorrow swallow those stormy eyes that held more pain than she could imagine, but she felt the impact as if he stood before her. All the assumptions, all the self-centered wallowing and shame seemed so trivial now. She’d been led astray by a teenaged mastermind, she’d become so lost in her own darkness that only physical gratification had made her whole, but none of that had truly taken her soul. No, Tom had tried and the war had fractured her, but given the chance she understood healing was possible. But for Malfoy? With so much pain and death on his hands? With the death of his wife despite the brutalities he’d committed to save her? She could not imagine how dark and tormented he must be.

And yet he’d saved her. He’d taken her away from Tom and released her from the prison of her mind. He’d given her the tools to protect herself and the hope that one day she might be whole again. Despite everything he’d endured. She could hardly fathom the strength, the mental fortitude required for such a herculean feat. Hermione had never seen him falter—anger, yes; succumb to the pain of his curse, sure—but never give up.

Gradually the pressure of her nails retreated and her hands slipped from fists to dangle idly in the still steaming water below. She flexed her fingers, then her toes, breathing deeply as she let the tension drain. It was not her place to act on the knowledge she now had. If Malfoy chose to tell her, she would be glad, but she would not force this confession from his lips to her ears. She could only let go of her doubt, of the unsettling feeling that her greatest ally was made of the darkest mettle. His darkness was nothing but a product of his own suffering and she would no longer fault him for it.

A knock on the door had her lifting her head. When had Grindelwald left? She’d been so caught up in her ruminations she couldn’t remember hearing him go. Shaking her head, she angled her body toward the door. “Enter.”

Malfoy slipped in, shutting the door gently behind him. “He’s gone.”

“What did he want?”

He ran a weary hand through his dirty locks, eyes dull as he met her inquisitive stare. “Too much. But suffice it to say, we now know what’s expected of us. He wants us to help train his army. To bring them up to date with the most modern battle strategies and spells. And then, he wants us to lead them into battle.”

“You’re sure this is worth it? Tom is likely looking for us already. We could prepare for him without involving Grindelwald and his war.” It would be next to impossible, but perhaps the two of them working together would be a match for Tom.

“No. It’s too risky. I’ve underestimated Voldemort too many times in my life to start now. With the full backing of Grindelwald and his army we will be able to disarm him and then destroy him.” Hermione understood now just how much Malfoy had lost in that underestimation. His tense jaw and fractured stare made so much more sense.

“But we have to destroy the… objects first.” It seemed unwise to breathe a word of the Horcruxes.

Malfoy’s lips twisted, his handsome features distorting to something beyond distaste or pain. “Yes. Let me handle that.”

The urge not to trust him, to question was still there, but she laid it to rest without a second thought. “Fine. What’s first on our agenda with Grindelwald?”

“Training with the forces here at dawn. If we do well, we’ll move on to his main stronghold at Nurmengard for a few weeks. After that it’s back to the front lines.”

He said the words with as much acrimony as she felt. But the price would be worth it. What was another scar compared with destruction of the man who had wrought so much chaos on both their lives? Never mind she still felt drawn to that man, or at least to pieces of him, and would likely have to die to ensure his death was permanent. That was too much to grasp right now. Perhaps ever. Instead she focused on the determination that shone through the sorrow in those stormy eyes that refused to yield. One day at a time. That she could manage.


	29. Twenty Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I continue be amazed by all of you. Thank you. It is so good to hear from so many of you (new voices and old voices alike). You are truly an inspiration and I thank you for all you do to support me.
> 
> For those of you in the United States of America, I wish you a happy, safe and socially distanced 4th of July. Please don't blow up your neighborhood as we celebrate yet another year of our enduring experiment in democracy.
> 
> This next chapter is pretty short (comparatively), but it's also pretty sweet. After this things get pretty intense again, so it's a moment of fresh air and light before we plunge once more into the breach.

~*~ Twenty Nine ~*~

“Good!” Hermione lauded, pacing down the line of Grindelwald’s recruits. The sound of spells littered the air as they skirmished in small groups, defending and attacking in equal proportion. The air was charged, the crackle of magic thick. Each breath she took was a sharp reminder of the battlefield and all the blood, sweat and soul shattering horror it entailed. In a way she was thankful for the time training, the slow immersion into the abyss.

“Non-verbal only!” Malfoy commanded from beside her, keen eyes scouring the ranks.

They made an odd pair. Perhaps not to their pupils who only saw war-hardened instructors, chosen by their leader for their innovative style and prowess in battle. But beneath that guise stood an infamous Death Eater and an Order member, united in the perpetration of a war neither believed in. It was morally reprehensible. It made her stomach churn and her skin crawl every time she allowed herself to acknowledge the truth of it. She was training these wizards to fight in a war to enslave Muggles; it was everything she hated, everything that had driven her to stand beside Harry, everything she would never compromise. And yet here she was, training them, assisting in the oppression of her people. It didn’t matter that she knew Grindelwald didn’t win, that he even repented before his life was taken. In the course of this misadventure to the past she had betrayed absolutely everything she held dear.

The pit in her stomach was becoming harder to ignore, the urge to vomit incessant. She took a ragged breath and tried to focus, to see the shapes moving, to see beyond the haze of spells that promised bloodshed.

“That’s enough for today,” Malfoy called, his voice distant despite his hand resting on her forearm. The storm of magic abated and for a moment she was able to draw a labored breath. Malfoy’s grip on her arm tightened and then their feet were moving, the voices of Grindelwald’s supporters fading to a distant murmur. It was some time before Malfoy let his warm hand fall from her coat with a quiet rustle.

“What’s going on, Hermione?”

What wasn’t? She had no idea how he could be so calm and collected. She suspected it had something to do with the magnitude of trauma he bore already. Shaking her head, she focused on the snow-capped alps in the distance. “I’m fine.”

“You’re clearly not fine,” he replied, weary now. “Is it Riddle?”

“No.” No. She’d been very careful to keep her Occlumency at maximum since arriving at Nurmengard. Threats existed around every corner and she would not allow Tom to complicate an already delicate situation. But there was a facet of her return to active duty that did gnaw at her, reminding her of how vulnerable she truly was. “Malfoy, have I lost time at all since you found me at Riddle House?”

The storms in his eyes grew frantic, as if he’d just remembered how exactly they’d ended up here. “I…” He paused, head tilting, platinum bangs falling to obscure his turbulent stare. “I don’t think so. We had you out during the trip most of the time, but when you were awake you never seemed unaware.”

“Did I ever seem disoriented? Like I knew where I was, but couldn’t remember what I had been doing?” It was the easiest way she knew to describe the experience. She always had a sense of missing something, but it was never concrete, never detailed enough to make her sure.

“No. I don’t think so and I have been watching for the signs, Hermione. I would have let you know if I thought it was happening again. If anything, you seem healthier than… well, than I can remember.” She understood what he wasn’t saying, that she had been a disaster for most of their recent acquaintance.

“I didn’t think so.” She took a deep breath, focusing on the crisp mountain air, not the acrid tang of magic still tainting her mouth. “But with our being sent to fight in a matter of days, I worry. It started during the war, what if it comes back full force again? At the worst of it I think I was losing time daily.”

“I’ll have your back.”

It was a deceptively simple statement that meant so much more. “But what if I do lose time and he gets back in?”

Malfoy abruptly shifted, his large hands grasping her shoulders firmly, but not so tightly as to hurt. He ducked his head until their eyes were level, the sharp angle of his cheekbones lit dramatically in the late afternoon sun. His pupils were fathomless, but the tempests in his irises were calm. “I will not allow that to happen, Hermione. I promised you I would free you from him and I will not go back on my word.”

Hermione wondered if he’d promised his wife he’d keep her safe too. It was a cruel thought, born of terror. She forced it away, acknowledging only the determined set of his jaw. “War already destroyed me once, Malfoy.”

“Draco.” He wavered minutely closer to her, his hair brushing softly against her cheek. “My name is Draco. Malfoy is my father, his father, every other blood purist arse that came before me.”

She blinked, turning the name over on her tongue silently. She didn’t think she’d ever thought of him by that name, not even during their years in school together. He’d always been one of those blood purist arses until now. Looking into those eyes that still closeted so much agony, she could not deny him this. “Draco.”

His lids fluttered shut, long lashes clear against his pale skin. They had spent the last few weeks in the sun and his pallor had improved from ashen to pale bronze, making him look far less like the marble statue she’d often imagined him to be. He took a shuddering breath, his fingers slipping down the lengths of her arms to clasp her hands in his. “I will not fail you, Hermione.”

She understood his vow to be much more than it seemed. She returned the pressure, hands twining firmly with his. “I know.”


	30. Thirty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love hearing from so many different readers, so many different voices. It's truly a privilege to read every word you all decide to share with me. So thank you for your continued support.
> 
> This scene is perhaps my favorite-certainly one of my favorites-that I have ever written, fanfiction or otherwise. I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

~*~ Thirty ~*~

The stench of battle was as acrid as she remembered, the chaos just as disorienting. Her throat was raw from the constant screaming of curses and the orders she now had to provide. The thick tang of magic coated her mouth, inescapable and impossible to ignore. Every spell, every directive reminded her just how unpleasant battle was. She wished for water, for the clean mountain air to slide through her lungs, untainted and pure. But they were no longer in the Alps and the thunder of Muggle bombings echoed from the horizon beyond their position. It didn’t matter who you were, Muggle or Wizard, there would be no safe haven here.

A bolt of brilliant green jetted past her head, missing by mere inches. She jerked back, refocusing on the fight at hand. Another killing burst exploded to her right, but she was ready this time, firing back a handful of dark curses that she reserved for those bold enough to attempt the Killing Curse. There was a shriek and then the metallic scent of blood, copious enough to tell her there would be no further green light. She circled back around, firing a curse over her shoulder followed by a more audible, “ _Diffindo_!”

The metallic scent increased and her lips turned up in grim satisfaction. They were surrounded, which might have made her nervous with another partner, but she was back to back with Draco Malfoy. It shouldn’t have made her feel safe; it should have set her hair on end and made her run screaming, but it didn’t. No, she felt—for the first time ever—perfectly at ease in the midst of battle. And it wasn’t just his skill with a wand or his reputation as a great dueler. It was simply the fact that it was him. The only soul in the entire universe she could trust was standing beside her in this hell and she would not have it any other way, despite his past. Despite hers.

His shield flared around them and she set to work thinning the encroaching enemy lines. She hadn’t been holding back, although she knew she should. These people were not Death Eaters; they did not deserve her wrath. But she was so tired of treading lightly, of keeping her aim so tentatively precise. Their lives were on the line—by no choice of their own—and she would deal with the guilt later. There was already so much to atone for, what was another death?

A part of her, a part that was growing stronger with every passing day, refused to give in. Another death mattered. She switched from a deadly hex to a simple _perfectus totalus_. The body dropped just the same and she moved on to her next target.

It took her a few minutes to realize Malfoy was stunning his opponents as well, neither of them leaving a body count any longer. She almost laughed at the absurdity of it. But then a particularly nasty spell caught her cheek and pain blossomed, her vision narrowing. She muttered a quick clotting incantation under her breath, swinging to face her would-be attacker.

He was only a boy, perhaps a year or two younger than she’d been at the start of the war. His eyes were wide with terror, his wand trembling between his fingers as he took a tentative step forward. She could see his mouth working, trying to muster the courage to form the syllables of the Killing Curse. The sight broke her heart, an instant reminder of just how much war robbed the innocent. He fell backward a moment later, frozen in his doomed attempt.

Draco—it still felt odd to think of him that way—met her stare, stormy eyes filled with crystalline focus. She nodded to him, murmuring a quiet, “Thanks.”

They fell into a comfortable rhythm after that, each defending and attacking in turn, neither causing harm if they could help it. The others under their command were less reserved, but their arsenal was also significantly reduced and the overall casualties were far fewer and the injuries less severe than any of the fights she’d ever survived during the war. There was still blood everywhere, leaking down her brow into her eyes, in a ragged line across Draco’s sternum, splattered across the cold mud at their feet. But by the time their enemy retreated, gathering their injured and incapacitated in large droves, the feeling of mortality was fading, life still thrumming steadily through her veins.

The crack of apparation, including the additional nausea that came from riding sidelong with Draco, echoed in her bones as they stumbled onto the steps of Nurmengard to find Grindelwald with a pleased smirk across his thin, pale lips.

“A first victory to my finest commanders.”

Draco’s head bent, eyes tracing the patterns of the stone at Grindelwald’s feet. Hermione attempted to follow suit, but found such deference came much more unnaturally to her. Draco frowned, as if sensing her struggle, but merely said, “Thank you, my Lord.”

“Get yourselves cleaned up before our victory banquet.”

Hermione could hardly see how a victory like theirs deserved a banquet, but she wasn’t about to argue with the first part of his directive. The smell of battle, perhaps less sour than usual, still clung to her every pore. What she wouldn’t do for a thorough _scourgify_ followed by a long soak in the tub.

“Yes, my Lord,” Draco intoned, bowing his head deeply again.

“My Lord,” Hermione managed, not quite able to match his subservient tone.

Then they were moving, Draco’s hand at the small of her back, guiding her swiftly to their suite. The move from the manor near Grenoble to the castle at Nurmengard had afforded them significantly more luxurious lodgings, which included two separate bedrooms, a receiving room with adjacent balcony and a full bath with magically enhanced plumbing. To her surprise Draco led her directly to the bathroom, indicating for her to sit on the ornate bench adjacent to the large tiled platform that housed the oversized tub.

He rummaged around in one of the drawers below the sinks until he came up with a bottle of ointment and a fresh cloth. He ran the cloth under the sink before returning to her side. Without warning his hand was tangling in her wild locks, pushing the hair aside as he studied the skin beneath. Focus unwavering, he drew the cloth gently across her brow and she hissed, the sting of an open wound cutting through her.

“Sorry,” he murmured, intense eyes still fixated on her temple. “It’s best to clean them before I heal them.”

Hermione knew that. Anyone who’d endured a battle knew that. But the gentle way he was touching her, the intense way his stare seared into her hairline, that was new. She and Harry had helped each other on plenty of occasions, but never with the degree of care Draco was exhibiting. It felt foreign; it felt perfect, like coming home at last.

She shifted, swallowing heavily. Draco didn’t seem to notice as he moved on to cleaning the rest of her face, his touch reverential and impossible. When he came to her collar his eyes flickered to meet hers, the question in them clear. She didn’t hesitate, hands lifting to her buttons as she shrugged off her robes and then her blouse, leaving only a plain bra behind. She’d been hit in several locations on her torso and it wasn’t like he hadn’t seen her naked before. Tom had forced him to watch her come undone on his hand for Godric’s sake. That encounter had involved consent from neither of them. If she was to move beyond that trespass, she would have to make new memories, ones that involved trust, not blind lust.

As if sensing her intention, Draco sank to his knees beside her, eyes clinging to hers as the path of his hand continued downward, over the swell of her breasts and onward to the plane of stomach. Her skin twitched, her breath catching, but he didn’t look away from her face, not even as he swabbed the wounds clean. Then he was whispering quietly against her skin. “ _Episky_.”

The wound itched then knotted together, the blood flow cutting off. Draco repeated the incantation on a number of other injuries he deemed too serious to let heal naturally. When he was done, he rose to his feet, retreating a step to survey her, studying his handiwork. Apparently satisfied, he moved to leave, but Hermione caught his wrist. A gentle tug and he was standing before her once more, brow raised.

“My turn,” was all she said.

He blinked, owlish. She suppressed a smile and stole the cloth from his limp fingers before pushing him down on the bench. He complied, too shocked to do more than yield. His face was relatively free of any wounds, but she folded the cloth to a clean side and gently wiped the dirt from the angular panes of his cheeks. This close, he was more handsome, his skin more luminous, his eyes the depths of an indominable storm. She barely resisted tracing the strong line of his jaw or the full swell of his lips. But this wasn’t about desire. It was about an intimacy she had never experienced before, a closeness that came from safety and security, not the need to satisfy an ache born of misery and violence. That need was a mere shadow now, more scar than pulsing wound.

So when he wordlessly shed his robes and shirt, she did not press her mouth to those enticing contours of his chest, to the strong lines of his pecs and gentle roll of his abs. No, she merely found the deepest of his wounds and dabbed until the blood was clear and the dirt long gone. Then she moved on to the next, fingers gently ghosting over his skin in search of injury, her only intent to heal. He’d been hit far more on his back than she had, which told her she needed to be more vigilant about guarding it for him. But still the injuries were minor, nothing a hot rag and a wave of her wand didn’t fix.

When she was done, he guided her over to the sink, dropping the rag into it. His hand was hot on her skin as he turned her around, her back against the sink, his bare chest a hair’s width from hers. She was against him in an instant, her arms wrapping tightly around him, his warmth blossoming into her in steady waves. His arms came up slowly, but then came around her with a force that took her breath away, his nose nuzzling into the crook of her neck, his breath hot, but steady against her skin. Hermione clung to him, relishing the feel of someone against her with no agenda but to be closer, to communicate the depth of a feeling that had nothing to do with sexual attraction.

“Thank you,” she whispered, unable to form more complex words to describe what he was giving her.

His embrace tightened a fraction, his face burrowing further into her hair. “Always.”

They stood there, simply intertwined, until Draco finally retreated, a wince on his lips. He stumbled a step backward, dropping heavily to sit on the bench.

“Are you…?”

He bit his lip, pure agony skating over his features for a moment. Heaving a sigh, he shook his head. “Nothing to do but wait. I’ve been working it close to the ragged edge for the past couple of weeks and the battle certainly did it no good.”

“You need to take it easy, if we’re going to survive this.” She leveled a glare at him that was only half playful. “I need you. I can’t do this without you.”

“You are far more capable than you think.”

Her eyes rolled before she could stop them. “You do remember the part where I came to the past to kill Tom but ended up being seduced by him? Or the part where fighting on a battlefield turned me into a sex addict, right?”

“You’re not a sex addict.” He looked unamused.

“No, just a bloody whore, right?” Her words weren’t even angry, just resigned.

Draco was glaring at her now, an angry twist to his lips that had nothing to do with the pain in his leg. “Just because I’ve said a million terrible things, doesn’t mean you should remember them. I was angry and confused when I called you that. I apologize. You are not a whore. You turned to sex for comfort and I used that against you. More than once. I just… I was projecting on to you, making you accountable for things you’d never done, decisions that I’d made. Consequences I have to endure.”

All involving his wife’s imprisonment and death no doubt. Hermione shook her head, forcing the thought aside. “My point was that I’m useless here without your help. You’re the only one who’s made me feel even remotely human since the beginning of the war, Draco, and I cannot lose that.”

He sighed, the fight draining out of him. “I have no intention of leaving you in this hell on your own.”

“Then take care of yourself.”

“Fine,” he muttered, storm clouds behind his eyes. “Help me to bed?”

She took a step forward and he rose gingerly to his feet, his left arm settling over her bare shoulders. Together they made slow, but steady progress to his bedroom. A thin veneer of sweat covered his brow when he collapsed to the bed, Hermione helping him lift the cursed limb as he scooted further back until his head could rest gently on the pillows.

She ran a hand over his matted hair. “It’s okay to need help.”

He didn’t answer, but he did grip her hand tightly for a moment before slumping into the mattress, strength sapped. She allowed herself a wistful glance at his haggard features before she retreated to the bathroom once more, taps turned to full blast and steam filling the room as she finally sank into the bath.


	31. Thirty One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all. You are an amazing audience and I'm so happy to share my writing with you. And now...
> 
> In which many questions are answered and we learn much about one Draco Malfoy.

~*~ Thirty One ~*~

Hermione glared up at the flapping material of the tent, the incessant snap of the cloth in the bitter wind driving her closer to madness with every passing second. How were any of them sleeping through this? Perhaps they weren’t. They’d split up their forces among a number of tents, leaving the smallest for the two commanders. Which meant the only other person in her tent was Draco and he was out cold. It also meant they likely had the flimsiest tent despite the magic imbued in its threads. At least it wasn’t cold, despite the wail of the wind and the never-ending dance of fabric it blew.

Sighing, she shifted onto her side, thankful for the magically enhanced pallet she’d packed the last time they’d stopped at Nurmengard. Despite their ability to apparate to and from battle sites in the blink of an eye, Grindelwald had decided the risk of their enemies tracking their movements back to his fortress had become too high. Hence the tents and howling winds. It wasn’t the first time she’d been in battlefront accommodations. There had been plenty of times they’d had a battle rage for days, sometimes weeks, making it necessary to swap in rested troops while pulling out those on the brink of exhaustion. She still remembered trying to find some semblance of rest while the screams of her comrades broke through the velvet night, impossible to ignore. Now, at least, there was only the howl of the wind and the bitter silence of a frigid night. It seemed some sense of propriety still existed in 1944 and wizards did not fight their battles through the night.

“No… No…” Draco whimpered, making her bolt upright from her pallet. His brow was damp and his features contorted as he continued to speak frantically, caught in some nightmare of memory or fiction. “Please… I beg you. I will do whatever you ask… please…”

The pleas continued, his voice contorted by ever increasing desperation until Hermione could bear it no longer. She’d hoped he would wake himself or that the dream would pass, but it was clear neither outcome was forthcoming. Steeling herself, she crawled across the distance between them, a space of half her height, and gripped his shoulders. Her touch soothed him for a moment, but then the cries were back, his voice cracking in a way that echoed in the depths of her soul. Unwilling to wait another moment, she shook him fiercely.

His eyes sprang open, sightless and wild in the shadows of their tent. Then his hands were on her, tracing her face, hovering over her lips as a sigh of relief passed through his. “Astoria. Thank Merlin.”

Hermione’s heart splintered, its jagged fragments cutting into every facet of her soul. It took all her willpower to correct him. “No. It’s Hermione. Astoria is…”

“Dead,” he finished dully, his bearings returning to him. He dropped his hands from her face with a ragged gasp. “I’m sorry.”

Hermione caught one of his limp hands, lacing their fingers together. He didn’t fight her, his breathing still uneven. She took a fortifying breath before asking, “You married Astoria Greengrass?”

His fingers twitched against hers, but he didn’t pull away. “Yes.”

“That’s why you looked like you’d seen a ghost when we met Aurelia.”

“I didn’t expect her great aunt to look quite so much like her. It was… difficult at first.” Hermione remembered the queasy look that had accompanied his ashen features. It must have been more than difficult to see even the slightest traces of his wife in Hermione’s roommate. Hermione honestly couldn’t remember much about Astoria. She’d been in a lower year than them and had been significantly more reasonable than Daphne, but she couldn’t remember her face.

“You must have loved her very much.” That much was clear on his face, even through the agony of his memories.

He pushed up until he was sitting beside her, his features hidden by the darkness, but his thigh warm against hers, their hands still joined. “She was everything good about me. She taught me how to be strong, how to see through the lies our parents had told us, to understand that blood purity was an absurd notion. She loved to talk about you, Hermione. You were her favorite example of why our parents simply had to be wrong.”

“What?” It seemed wrong that Astoria Greengrass had known who Hermione was, but Hermione still couldn’t picture her face.

“You were the top of our year and Astoria loved to tell me that if a Muggle born like you could top every single pureblood, then blood had nothing to with magical power at all. Seventh year, when we were all still at the school, before Potter failed in his plot to draw the Dark Lord out to his death, before we were on the battlefield every day, she made it her mission to change my view. I don’t think she planned on me falling in love with her while doing it.”

Draco’s voice was rough, just this side of the ragged edge as he continued, “But I did. We were married before the end of the school year. Our parents thought it was a fabulous match, a perfect pureblood union. Little did they know neither of us believed in their rubbish any longer. But then Potter screwed up and the Dark Lord decided school was less important than war.”

Hermione remembered the first battle like it was yesterday. The others might have melded into a single mire of death and blood and bile, but it stood alone. They’d thought they’d eliminated all the Horcruxes, but hadn’t figured out that Harry was one of them or that the Hallows might help. So Harry had faced down Voldemort with their twin cores once again and ended up in St. Mungo’s for a month. Another month later Voldemort had taken significant portions of the ministry under his control and the war began in earnest.

The battle had been on the school grounds, the student body dividing along house lines with few exceptions. She briefly recalled dueling with Draco at the end of a hallway, fiendfyre licking around their heels as the Room of Requirement burned. He’d interrupted them destroying the Ravenclaw diadem. But then he’d slipped away, rushing toward the sound of a female voice screaming further down the hall. She’d let him go, more important foes than a former classmate demanding her attention.

“How did…” She trailed off, not sure how to ask the question.

But Draco seemed to understand what she wanted to know. “My aunt was killed during that first battle by Molly Weasley, so the Dark Lord was in the market for a new… assistant.” Hermione could hear him swallow, could feel the tremble of his leg where it touched hers. “He knew no one would be as loyal to him as she had been. He also wanted someone younger, more agile and powerful than his former ranks. He also knew I’d just married Astoria. When I returned from Hogwarts to the Manor after the battle, he was…” Draco paused, breath guttering for a long moment. “He was there with her, his wand at her neck, his hands in her shirt, her…”

He couldn’t finish and Hermione didn’t ask him to. The implication, the truth of what had been done to his wife made her quiver, rage singing through her veins. “And he kept her.”

“Yes,” he admitted. “We shared a bedroom at the Manor, but she was his prisoner, never allowed anywhere outside our room unless he was present. I tried to be strong for her, to resist him, to find a way out, but my parents didn’t believe me and he soon resorted to much more compelling methods than simply putting his hands where they didn’t belong.”

“He tortured her.”

“For hours at a time. To the brink of insanity. Until she begged me just to do as he wished.” His hand was a claw around hers, all tension and unchecked fury. “I finally gave in.”

“I…” but what did one say in the face of such inhumanity, such incomprehensible suffering? I’m sorry seemed far too little. “I can’t fathom what that must have been like.”

“If only that was the extent of it, Hermione,” Draco breathed, more weary than a man his age had any right to sound. Her head shot up, meeting the shadow of his stare in the darkness. “He knew my allegiance was only as strong as his control over her, and by extension me. Even once I’d become the killer he wanted, the torture hungry fiend the Order now hunted, he would not relinquish that control. He knew I would turn against him. I shielded against him constantly, made sure he never knew how I truly felt, but he was a monster, not a fool. So he tested potions on her, tortured her when I wasn’t effective enough, when I didn’t inflict enough suffering or destroy enough lives.”

All the stories made sense now. How wicked Draco had become, how senseless his crimes had been. He’d damned the world to save his wife. And yet he hadn’t. “But…”

“But then the best and worst thing happened. We’d stopped being careful, sure the torture and potions had weakened her body beyond its capability to carry children.” Hermione couldn’t help the breath she sucked in, the sudden tension in her fingers where they clasped his. “We were wrong. Eight months before I found you on that Tower, she got pregnant. We knew it was ours. He’d been cruel to her, touched her in ways that I can never forget, but he had never raped her.”

“You were going to be a father,” Hermione breathed, a new chill settling over her.

“Yes.” He canted his head toward her, eyes sparkling in the darkness. “It was the happiest day of my life when she told me. It didn’t matter that my hands were covered in blood or that there were bruises wringing her neck, for one moment we were just two people in love who had created something special.”

If his frantic belief that she was Astoria, alive and restored, had shattered her soul, then this consumed it, burned it to ash until all she could taste was the soot on her tongue. He’d lost not only his wife, but also his unborn child. She asked about his curse instead.

He sighed. “It was early, when I still thought it was possible to save her from him, to run away together and escape the war entirely. He caught us and dragged us back. Gave her some potion that had her puking for days and me this festering wound forever stamped beneath my skin.” He traced the outline of the angry lines beneath his loose trousers with their joined hands. “Now I welcome the pain, the reminder of what he took from me, from both of us, from our child.”

Hermione trembled, but whether from rage or the chill of the night it was hard to say. Draco broke their hands apart only to draw her into an embrace. She let her head settle on his shoulder, the sound of his pulse echoing in her ear. “I wish—”

“I’ve learned to stop wishing. Nothing good can come of might have beens.” The irony of his words was not lost on her. Here they were in the past, attempting to rewrite history, perhaps the most powerful might have been of all.

“How did she—they—die?”

“An experiment of his gone wrong. It wasn’t even an attempt to punish me, it was just the Dark Lord being careless with human life as he is wont to do. He didn’t tell me until several weeks after the fact. I never even got to see her body or learn where they were buried.” There was a desolate kind of horror behind his words, the type that would be forever seared into her memory, wholly impossible to erase.

Hermione leaned further into him, trying to give him something she couldn’t quite name. He pressed a cool kiss to her brow. It was a long time before she said, “It was the day of the final battle, the one where Harry died, that you found out, wasn’t it?”

He nodded against her hair. “I wouldn’t have believed him but my mother confirmed it. Then I saw you heading for the Astronomy Tower and I prayed you were up to something that would stop him, end the war. Or that perhaps you would just kill me and it would finally be over.”

“No wonder you were so angry,” she murmured into his shoulder. “I can’t believe you’ve been dealing with this alone for so long. And you had to watch me make a complete fool of myself, using empty physical gratification as a coping mechanism, falling for the man who would grow up to kill your wife and child. Godric, Draco, I have no idea how you didn’t just murder us all.”

“Oh, I was severely tempted to on many occasions. But Astoria always believed in Hermione Granger, so I decided I would too.” Hermione wasn’t sure what she made of this revelation. That Draco was supporting her not because he thought she was worth it, but because his deceased wife had thought so. As if sensing her train of thought, he added, “I made that choice before I knew you again. Once I’d spent time with you, even when you were clearly under Riddle’s influence, I could make my own decision and I still picked you. I know you don’t see it, but you are the cleverest witch of our age and I’m not going to let Tom bloody Riddle take that away from you.”

“Oh.” It wasn’t the most articulate response, but it conveyed her acceptance of his clarification.

“And to be clear, this Riddle isn’t anything like the monster that took my family from me.” Hermione frowned, shifting so she could see the outline of his jaw as he spoke. “I saw the way he looked at you, when he was sure he’d enchanted his followers to be otherwise occupied. He’s in love with you. He’s capable of emotions the monster I knew could never have. He thinks he’s protecting you by controlling your mind, by bonding with you. He doesn’t view it as possession so much as ensuring your well-being. He’s completely off base and wrong, but he still has a soul.”

“And we still have to kill him.” There was a certain misery to those words that Hermione felt deep in her chest.

“I am sorry,” Draco murmured, “That you have to kill him. I would not ask it of you if I saw any other path forward.”

Hermione breathed out a bone shuddering sigh. “I could never love him enough to save him. Not after everything he did.”

“Apparently I couldn’t love her enough either.”

“It’s not the same thing at all.”

“Isn’t it?”

Her cheek was suddenly damp, but her eyes were only just limned with moisture. It took her a moment to realize the warm rivulets flowing across her skin were Draco’s tears and not her own. The realization cracked the dam of her control and soon their grief intermingled, their bodies shaking as they wept together in the darkness, the howl of the wind drowning out the wretched sound of their sobs.


	32. Thirty Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, the outpouring of thoughtful comments after Draco's tragic story was incredible. The amount each of you care for his character is wonderful and inspiring. Thank you for seeing that has been done to him without his permission and understanding how strong anyone must be to endure the constant pain, both physical and emotional. While Draco may not be real, there are so many humans out there with such complicated stories, who need our love and support, not our condemnation. So please be kind as you face the great sea of humanity because everyone's story is something to be respected and all deserve the space to tell their tale. 
> 
> Okay moving slowly onward, so much action and heartbreak still to come.

~*~ Thirty Two ~*~

The letter arrived after a battle that had been—in the scheme of Hermione’s experience—truly unremarkable. The fighting had lasted perhaps fifteen minutes and their highly organized movements and nascent formations had run over the enemy’s chaos like flour through a sieve. If the majority of their troops hadn’t taken to following Hermione and Draco’s lead of stunning, not maiming or killing, she would have felt inordinately guilty. As it stood, it was simply underwhelming. By the time they’d returned to camp many of their younger recruits were rearing to go again, certain they could secure a permanent victory over the contested river bend. But total victory wasn’t what Grindelwald wanted. He’d been very clear in his desire to hone his forces on the battlefield, but restrain them. The true strength of his army wouldn’t be revealed until later, more strategic conflicts.

The owl that delivered the letter was clearly one of the many housed in the Owlery at Hogwarts; it had no distinctive markings and was an unremarkable tawny brown with wide eyes that seemed entirely bored, despite the sound of Muggle mortars in the distance. It swooped down and perched on Hermione’s shoulder, its talons digging into her skin until Draco offered it a piece of his ration cooking by the makeshift stove they’d placed above the fire in their latest camp. Upon receiving the morsel, it promptly dropped the sealed parchment onto the muddy ground below and returned whence it came.

Rubbing her shoulder—the owl had caused more damaged than the battle—Hermione stared down at the letter, unsure what to think. If it came from Hogwarts, it could only be from a handful of people. She doubted Aurelia would be writing, but it was possible. In all likelihood it was from Tom. And if it was from him, she had absolutely no interest in putting her fingers on that parchment; he’d likely enchanted it to do something dastardly upon contact.

Draco settled next to her on the makeshift bench, a log they’d flattened through a combination of magic and rudimentary carpentry. “I’ll open it.”

She shrugged like it didn’t matter either way, but was secretly thankful for his intervention. “If you want.”

He gave her a look, one that communicated he knew exactly the magnitude of the favor he was doing her, but picked up the letter. She sighed, watching his lithe fingers tear the seal and unfurl the parchment. She’d been watching him more lately, less in the way one might observe a predator and more in the way one studied a friend. With her understanding of what he had survived, the cruel twist of her heart every time she acknowledged the unfathomable depths of his loss, she finally saw him without the veil of suspicion. She knew he’d still committed every brutality she had heard whispered, knew that he was objectively unforgivable, but her heart had pardoned him without a second thought, even if the depths of her soul could not. Given his situation, she had no idea what she might have done. Hermione had the feeling she’d never loved anyone, not even her parents, with the fervor that he’d loved Astoria and their child. If her role in the war had taught her anything, it was that desperation could drive anyone to anything given the right circumstances. He’d been compelled into monstrosity; she’d faded into mediocrity.

Thinking about it did nothing but turn her stomach sour and make her eyes limn with moisture. There was too much tragedy in those memories, too much lost between the two of them to warrant such reminiscence. Clearing her throat, Hermione slanted her gaze to where Draco was still reading the letter. His expression was bland, as if reading a textbook, but she could see the storms in his eyes gaining ferocity as he continued. When he finished, he wordlessly handed the parchment to her.

Taking that as a sign no hidden curses lurked within its depths, Hermione accepted it, noting the signature before starting at the beginning. It was from Dumbledore, which shouldn’t have surprised her, but did.

_My dear Hermione,_

_I can only hope that this missive finds you safe. I have debated the merits of writing this letter a number of times and I have finally decided the benefits far outweigh the risks, even if it does fall into the wrong hands. It took us all by some surprise when you, Mr. Riddle and Mr. Mallet (or shall we simply acknowledge him as Mr. Malfoy?) disappeared from school on St. Valentine’s Day. Mr. Riddle returned a week later without either of you, which had me fearing the worst, especially with the news out of Little Hangleton about the tragedies at Riddle House. The local authorities are blaming the deaths on Tom Riddle, Sr. and the local Reverend is backing them up. The ministry has sent officials to investigate, but none of the family members or the maid were killed with magic, so it is impossible to tell. I fear Tom has escaped unscathed from whatever his role might have been in this tragedy. The investigation did reveal one interesting detail to me, Hermione. It seems you are legally married to Tom Riddle, Jr. I confess this surprises me greatly since I was under the impression you were here to prevent certain escalations, not join them._

_I am equally surprised by the disappearance of Mr. Malfoy. While I never sensed any ill intentions from him while he was under my roof, I got the general impression of his character from your recollections of him. I worry that if he has gone after you, you may be in grave danger. I would impress upon you to remain vigilant and to be discerning in your trust of either gentleman._

_Indeed, I have come by some distressing news, which is the primary reason I write to you. There are reports of new leadership within Grindelwald’s ranks. One of them very closely matches the description of Mr. Malfoy you provided me. I worry that if he has joined the war effort to support Muggle oppression that his strategic knowledge will put many of us in danger. His companion is supposedly female, but I have not been able to gain an accurate description of her to provide you._

_Beyond this very serious concern, I have noticed that Mr. Riddle is behaving even more impertinently than usual. Unfortunately, Headmaster Dippet still refuses to see his behavior for what it is. I fear Mr. Riddle may do something even more detrimental than he already has in the near future._

_It is my profound hope this letter reaches you and that you are not among the victims of either of the aforementioned gentlemen. Please do not attempt to reply as I feel the writing of this letter is risk enough._

_All my best,_

_Albus Dumbledore_

Hermione couldn’t help the amused chortle that escaped her lips as she tossed the letter into the flames fueling the camp stove. “He seems to be under the impression I’m in mortal danger from you.”

Draco’s lips were a flat, unimpressed line. “Up until recently, you were under the same impression.”

“Yes, you don’t exactly advertise that you’re a hopeless romantic under that furrowed brow and sneer.” Hopeless romantic wasn’t exactly the most appropriate or sensitive way to describe him, but the words had come out before she could think better of them. She swallowed, mouth dry as his eyes flared.

But he didn’t rise to the bait, sighing instead. “I don’t have any idea what I am. I’ve been playing a part my entire life, Hermione. It was only with Astoria that I started to learn what I really liked, who I wanted to be. But then he stole all of that and now I don’t think it’s possible to go back. I can’t forget what I’ve done. I’ll never atone for it, no matter how much good I do. I am exactly who Dumbledore thinks I am, who you thought I was. It doesn’t matter why I did it. The choice was made and the actions belong to no one else. I am…”

He trailed off, the pain lancing his eyes nearly more than Hermione could stomach. She knew she could never understand. It was not only the horror of what Voldemort had done to his wife, his family, but also the bitter truth of what his hands had wrought. There weren’t two of him, one trying to save his family and the other destroying everyone else’s. No, there was only one man, Draco Malfoy, and he had done both and in the end they had all burned, even Draco.

Since the night in the tent, he’d begun to talk about Astoria, but he’d never broached the deaths or the pain he had orchestrated. Hermione understood that was a horror even he could not acknowledge without breaking and they were not at liberty to collapse into humanity here, still in the dregs of war.

“You’re not a monster,” she told him, but a part of her, the part that couldn’t forget the losses, the bloody stories, the part of her soul that didn’t pardon him, didn’t believe the words at all.

As if sensing her doubt, her conviction only so powerful, he smiled, a bitter, rueful smile that fractured her soul a hair. “I know better than to ask for forgiveness, Hermione. I do not deserve it and I will not find it.”

The bitter taste in her mouth had nothing to do with the lingering scent of the battle. “You’re not currently a danger to me.”

“That’s true,” Draco allowed, peeling a hunk of meat off a skewer he’d removed from the camp fire. “If the old man is to be believed, it seems Riddle is biding his time, waiting for the opportune moment to find you. Which is good, because that means when our debt to Grindelwald is paid, he will be easy enough to collect.”

“If he hasn’t made his way here already.”

He looked at her sharply. “You haven’t had any weird dreams, have you? Moments where your shields might falter?”

Her nights had been relatively peaceful actually. Occasionally Draco’s nightmares woke them both, but her dreams had been calm, insignificant and unmemorable. She’d expected them to be turbulent; she’d expected time to start slipping through her grasp again. Neither had happened and she wasn’t entirely sure why. Perhaps it was the lack of bloodshed in most of their battles, the reassurance that she wasn’t leaving a pile of bodies behind. She’d been forced to kill and maim, but at infrequent intervals and only when it was necessary to preserve her life or Draco’s.

Or perhaps it was the steady presence of Draco by her side, a lethal shadow that protected her on and off the battlefield. She’d never had that before. Harry had always been more aggressive, unerringly reckless with his life as he led their forces. With Draco she’d realized leadership didn’t have to come in kamikaze-style attacks, and that they were more effective from within the ranks than in front of them. Whatever it was, she could feel the fractured facets of her soul slowly knitting together with each passing day. It was an odd realization that she could still heal despite the violence of her days.

“No. No cracks in the armor that I can sense. I barely even dream anymore. At least, not memorably,” she admitted.

“Lucky,” he muttered, almost too softly for her to hear. Shaking his head, which caused platinum stands to fall haphazardly into his face, he added at higher volume, “Then it’s likely he doesn’t know where you are. Although if Dumbledore is right about the news of our command making it to Britain, it’s likely Riddle will put together the pieces sooner rather than later. He always was a clever sod, at least, before he lost his mind.”

“When exactly will Grindelwald consider our debt paid?” That was the question that had plagued her as the weeks became a month and then two. They’d left Hogwarts in February, arrived in Grenoble in March, but it was May now and still there was no sign Grindelwald was satisfied.

Draco’s face had a haunted look that told her this wasn’t the first time he’d pondered their situation. “We may have to consider Grindelwald won’t seek Tom out on his own. We’ve become an essential part of his army; it would be foolish for him to give us up.”

“And if Tom does arrive on his own?”

“Then it’s likely he will honor our agreement. I can’t imagine him letting the man who would kill him walk free.”

That, at least, was some consolation. They needed Grindelwald’s power if they had any hope of detaining Tom long enough to eliminate his Horcrux and then… she couldn’t quite think it. It had been so easy to imagine him dead when she’d first emerged from his manipulations, but as time mellowed the wound, her anger had become saturated with sorrow, with the loss of a boy who had meant something profound to her even when he’d been inside her head. The horrible truth was he truly hadn’t made her feel anything new, only made her doubts evaporate, her reservations disappear. She’d never had a regular boyfriend before him—she and Ron had only tried during the war, when everything was already falling apart—certainly never a husband, and as much as she wanted to deny it, beneath the deception had been a real connection, a connection that scraps of her soul still yearned to embrace.

That Draco seemed to understand the severity of her attachment to Tom and reserved judgment as often as he could manage was one of the reasons he’d come to mean so much to her. In a way both men had accepted her for who she was, only Tom had been too caught up in his lust for power to love her properly and Draco had his own burdens to bear. Before her trip to the past, she’d always hidden away, even with Harry and Ron, especially with Harry after Ron’s death. It was a welcome change, to be free, to embrace the brutal honesty of her relationship with Draco, to acknowledge the demented talons of Tom’s imperfect love. She would never go back to Tom, but she would always know he had seen her, had loved parts of her she never would.

Hermione accepted a skewer from Draco, forcing her thoughts in another direction. “Do you think Dumbledore will act on his suspicions about you?”

He paused mid-chew, considering. A minute or so later, he finally swallowed. “Now that you mention it, we might have accelerated the confrontation between Dumbledore and Grindelwald by a significant number of months. We’d better hope Riddle gets impatient. It would be a shame to have Dumbledore eliminate Grindelwald before he can be of any use to us.”

“Fudge,” Hermione lamented, numbly chewing.

“Indeed,” Draco murmured, pushing his hair behind his ear. It had grown down below his shoulders now, but he refused to tie it back, muttering under his breath that there was no way he was going to resemble his spineless father. Hermione thought he looked quite rakish with it falling wildly about, the strong angles of his jaw and cheekbones highlighted by its length. He certainly looked very little like the boy she’d known in school despite the return of his natural coloring. Sensing her stare, he gave her a curious look. “What?”

“I’m thinking you’d make a marvelous pirate.”

He blinked slowly, as if determining if he’d heard her correctly, and then let out a loud guffaw that had their recruits turning to stare. “I’d make a bloody fantastic pirate, Granger. Don’t you doubt it for a second.”

She giggled, honest to Merlin giggled, in response. It was the first time she’d laughed in a lifetime. It was the first time she’d ever heard him laugh. It wasn’t the hard, scornful cackle of his reign over the Hogwarts halls, but a genuine burst of humor that simply couldn’t be contained. They kept smiling until their jaws hurt, but Hermione felt alive, more settled in that moment than she had in years.


	33. Thirty Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for sticking with me and this story. We're about to switch gears again and I'm so excited to experience the next arc of the story with you, my amazing readers. I hope are are staying safe and healthy wherever you may be on this wonderful planet.
> 
> WARNINGS: Canon violence.

~*~ Thirty Three ~*~

A crash sounded behind Hermione, the concussive wave that followed nearly knocking her over. She ducked as another spell soared directly through the space her head had occupied. The smell of ozone and charred flesh was strong, enough to make the fight against dry heaves near constant. Whatever simplicity had existed in their previous engagements was gone now, the fighting matching the ferocity she remembered from the clashes of the Order and Death Eater ranks. She’d already been forced to draw blood a handful of times and she knew it was only a matter of when, not if, the first soul would fall to her wand. It was easier to ignore the twist in her gut, the knowledge that this death was not wholly necessary, when the spells were flying like lethal grasshoppers. She descended into the rhythm of the fight, sinking further into Draco’s space as they parried and swiped, incantations pouring from their wands like torrential rain.

“ _Protego_!” he hissed beside her and a flutter of attacking spells fizzled into nothing upon impact with the barrier. The shield charm sputtered and another volley was upon them before she could cast. They ducked instead, both rolling through the blood soaked mud, an arc of hexes tracking their retreat.

Hermione sliced her wand and another shield sprung into life long enough for them to clamber to their feet. The instant the barrier dropped, Draco hissed off a series of curses that made Hermione’s skin crawl, but gave them another second to breathe. A jet of green cut between them, both lunging aside as it singed their muddy cloaks. Draco let out a low growl and turned his wand in the direction of the attack, slashing wildly into the haze of blood, sweat and smoke.

“ _Sectumsempra_!”

There was a hollow shriek that cut off abruptly to a gurgling gasp. It left chills down her spine and bile coating her throat, but she didn’t have time to question Draco’s use of the curse. Her vision went bright white, heat seared into her chest and then a bloody scream tore from her lips. It was akin to the Cruciatus, but not as much pure agony as what Tom had done through their bond, not nearly so all-encompassing and personal. She could tell the curse was isolated to her chest, just below her left ribs, but the heat it produced was racing through her veins like a lit fuse, delivering agony to every nerve. Her lips were parted, a strangled yowl of torment still ripping from her raw throat.

She could feel Draco’s arms around her, his deep voice vibrating her chest as he hollered orders to their ranks. The sick twist of apparation followed a moment later and she couldn’t help the riot of her stomach and torrent of vomit that surged from her gagging mouth upon impact with solid ground.

Draco’s hand weaved through her hair, pulling it back until the heaves abated and she whimpered with pain again. He lifted her, cradling her in his arms before setting her on a supple surface she dimly recognized as a pallet. Ripping filled the air as he tore her shirt, her chest suddenly far too cold.

“Merlin,” he hissed between gritted teeth, a hand that was far too hot probing her ribs. She nearly heaved again and he reduced the pressure to a mere whisper of touch.

“This is going to hurt a lot bloody more before it hurts less, Granger. Can you deal with that?”

Her vision was too bleary to focus on his face, but his words were clear enough. She risked a glance down her body and saw only an angry swirl of red and black. Her lips were chapped and trembling as she managed to croak, “What is it?”

“ _Maledictum nocturno cruore_. Nasty curse that turns your blood into black ichor if you don’t treat it in time. It hurts like hell. Only way to get it out of you is to boil your blood, which is about as pleasant as it sounds.”

Hermione appreciated his matter of fact tone, but just the thought of her blood heating beyond the fever pitch it had already attained was enough to make her want to pass out. “And that’s survivable?”

“If I’m careful, yes.” His hand cupped her cheek, thumb rubbing gently across the moisture there. “I promise I’ll make it as quick as I can. It would be best if you stayed as still as possible. I could immobilize you if you think that would—”

“No.” She shook her head, pain rocketing up her neck at the movement. “No. Just do it. I’ll manage.”

Draco dropped a kiss across her forehead, murmuring, “Brave girl. I’ve got you. Just hold on a little bit longer.”

Then there was only a pure, agonizing burn that consumed every facet of her. It began at her fingers and toes, making her skin stretch outward, her blood surging toward freedom with ruthless pressure. The sensation slowly spread inwards, collapsing toward her abdomen in a steady crawl of torment. When it hit her face, she swore her eyeballs sizzled, the tears falling from them instantly dry. Her lips burned as if the skin had been rubbed raw then soaked in acid. But the worst by far, was the frenzied stutter of her heart, as if it could not withstand the pressure, as it lost a beat and then two. Then another. It took her a moment to realize the familiar pounding in her temples was absent, another to observe the light had faded, Draco now a mere shadow in a wash of grey.

Pressure slammed down on her chest, different from the burn she’d endured, but equally demanding. Then there was oxygen rushing into her lungs and a hint of cedar and mint tickling her nose. The pressure and breath intermingled as she floated, apart and above, deadened to the world.

Draco’s voice was an echo of something she might have understood, a plea she had no idea how to heed. But she clung to its familiarity, to the trust she had in him.

Her cough was ragged and deep, forcing her eyes open. Wide eyes stared back at her, luminous tempests that she did not understand.

“Fuck, Hermione.” Draco’s voice was lost, timid like a child’s. He knelt over her, his lips hovering a breath away from her mouth, his chest rising and falling in a rapid pant. “Fuck,” he muttered again before dropping his mouth to hers.

It was a messy kiss that tasted of bile and blood, but it was raw and honest too. Her lips were chapped, her breath shallow still, and his movements were frantic, uncoordinated and desperate. She lifted a hand to pull him more securely against her, wending her fingers through the matted strands of his silken hair. He groaned and increased the pressure between them, his tongue swiping across blood to find hers. She clung to him, welcoming the invasion, the taste of mint and the tranquility she remembered from their previous entanglement in Tom’s bedroom.

His teeth were sharp on her already abused lip and he pulled back immediately at her harsh inhale. Still breathing rapidly, Draco shifted, rolling to settle next to her on the narrow pallet that served as her bed. They were in their tent she noted, now that the world wasn’t shrouded in pain or shadow.

He let out a wretched sigh, his hand finding its way to clasp hers. “I can’t face losing you, Hermione. I’ve lost everything. I just can’t, not again.”

She wasn’t daft; she knew her heart had stopped, knew that he’d resorted to Muggle methods to resuscitate her. But there was air in her lungs and a steady leap of her pulse between their clasped hands. She would live to see another tomorrow and it was entirely due to the man beside her, the man whose kiss was currently searing her lips long after the effects of the blood curse had faded.

It had been different before, when it had been Tom’s mania bringing their mouths together, her mind entrapped in a web of misdirection. She hadn’t known the agonies of his soul, hadn’t known him at all. But now, now he was everything good in her world, everything that held her together and made her believe wounds could heal and scars could fade. No matter how much she wanted to pull him back to her, to feel that serenity only he seemed to evoke, she needed him to be her friend. She couldn’t bring herself to sully what they had with the messy lock of lips and slide of flesh.

“I can’t…” She had no idea how to tell Draco her need for him transcended flesh and blood and desire, all the baser instincts that had led her to ruin. In fact, need wasn’t a strong enough word for the sensation humming beneath her skin, swimming through her veins and blanketing her fragile heart. Her breath faltered as the truth slammed into her. This was no mere need; it was a profound love that had roots in every facet of her battered soul. She hadn’t understood she loved him until now, had never taken the time to identify the feeling that was as comfortable as her own skin, its strength born of his steadfast support.

He shifted, propping his chin on his hand to look down at her, his gaze warm despite her refusal. “I know. I would never ask anything of you.”

“It’s not that.” Or maybe it was, she really didn’t know what he meant, but she kept talking, searching for the words to describe to him the emotion vibrating within her. “I’m attracted to you. I do want you, but it feels… selfish to act on it. I’ve only ever been hurt that way and I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want to be hurt either, but it’s you I’m more worried about, honestly. We’ve both lost so much, Draco, and I need you too much for this to simply be a way for either of us, or both of us, to cope. I love you, Draco Malfoy, but I’m not willing to be in love with you. Not right now. I need you too bloody much to risk that.”

The storms in his eyes had extinguished while she spoke, brilliant silver shining through, the moon emerging from the shadow of a cloud. “I love you too, Hermione Granger.” He pressed his lips chastely against hers, an echo of heat chasing the brief caress. “I certainly didn’t plan to and I was as lost as a kneazle in a rainstorm when I realized what was happening, but I can’t say I regret a second of it. I’ve lived a life of regret, but you will never be one.”

It didn’t surprise her that he understood. While his hell had been distinctly more profound than hers, he knew her suffering well, knew the doubt and shame that lurked beneath the surface of her psyche, preying on her like worms upon the corpses of the dead. He knew every broken facet of her soul and yet he still loved her. She wanted to doubt his declaration, to refute that no one could love a broken thing like her, but she loved him and the fractured landscape of his soul made hers look veritably whole. She sighed, pulling him down to lay beside her, placing their palms above the steady drum of her heart. So they would love each other and that would be more than either of them deserved.

A wry smile crossed her lips, stretching the sore skin. “Aurelia had us pegged months ago. She kept telling me you cared about me, but I could never believe her. There was no way in the universe Draco Malfoy cared for Hermione Granger, no matter how much magic or time travel was involved. She was very put out when I kept shutting her down. We fought about it for weeks.”

His thumb ran gently across the back of her hand, the tender caress making her sigh softly against his shoulder. “Not surprising that the ability to read a Malfoy runs in the family. Although I’m fairly certain I still thought I wanted to murder you and Riddle for most of our time at Hogwarts. It was… painful to be back there, to see Aurelia and to remember what…” He trailed off, unable or unwilling to finish the sentence. For several long minutes it was only the rasp of her damaged lungs. Hermione didn’t mind the silence, content to wait until he speculated, “You know, I think Astoria would be happy I found you.”

“She wouldn’t be mad you’d found another?”

His breath tickled her skin, his lips moving against her hair when he spoke. “No. She hated our lives, hated what had happened to me more than anything he ever did to her. At some point I think she gave up, stopped thinking we’d find a way to escape or that Potter would win the war before we both met our violent ends. But when I look back, I realize she always knew I was going to outlive her, that the bastard would find a way to take her from me before he ran out of use for my abilities. She kept telling me to find something to hold on to, beyond her. I refused. She was everything to me and I would die before I let anything happen to her.” He let out a strangled laugh that was more muffled sob. “Except clearly I didn’t, did I?”

“And here we are.” Hermione could almost feel Astoria in the room with them, a gentle soul searching for peace, wanting nothing but happiness for the husband she’d left behind.

“She liked you, you know.”

“So you’ve told me.” Hermione turned so she could see the chiseled panes of his face, the bow of his lips and the stormy riot within his deep eyes. “She’d forgive you, you know. For not saving her. I might not have known her very well, but from what you’ve told me, I know she would forgive you.”

“I know,” he breathed, “but I will never forgive myself.”

“I forgive you too.” She brushed her lips across his sharp cheekbone, savoring the softness of his lightly bronzed skin. “I know you won’t accept it, but I do. You tried your best in a very bad situation. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone sane who could have survived what you endured.”

His eyes were desolate as he asked, “Who says I’m sane?”

Hermione rolled her eyes, shaking her head. “Relatively sane. We both know neither one of us has all our marbles anymore.”

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For not judging me. For wanting to know about Astoria. For finding a way to love a damaged man like me. It doesn’t matter if we never... I mean, I’m male and not quite an old man yet, so I’ll take what you’re willing to give me, but this isn’t about that. It’s about…”

“Acceptance,” she supplied, staring at him with every bit of her focus, memorizing the tilt of his brows, the pleased curve of his lip, the strong line of his jaw.

Draco’s breath caught, his grip tightening around her hand and then relaxing a beat later. “Yes. You see me and I can’t quite believe it.”

“Whenever you’re ready to stop hiding from your demons, Draco, I’ll be here.” She knew he wasn’t going to tell her today, or perhaps ever, but she needed him to know she would accept him as he was, raw scars, unspeakable horrors and all.

He was silent, as she had known he would be. But they allowed themselves a moment of rest, breath intermingling and frayed nerves calming, until the shouts outside their tent grew louder and the world had to be faced once more.


	34. Thirty Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so very much for all the support. You make my day better every time.
> 
> And now, things get real...

~*~ Thirty Four ~*~

A rough hand shoved her off the pallet, jarring her awake. Heart beating out of her chest, Hermione twisted away, fighting her sleep-dampened senses. She’d been dreaming, something pleasant and oh so far away from the hellscape of war, from the misery of months on the road, blood stains under her nails and throat raw with dark incantations a better witch would not know. She blinked, lashes fused and unwilling to face the harsh light flooding the tent. Hermione reached blindly for Draco, but his pallet was empty, cold even. An uneven breath later and she was bolt upright, his absence propelling her to abrupt clarity.

“What?” She squinted toward the light, but it was impossible to distinguish features beyond the harsh glare. “What’s going on? Where’s Draco?”

“Commander Malfoy is outside.” The voice was harsh, but familiar. Augusta Devereaux, Grindelwald’s right hand woman on the western front of his campaign. She was an austere woman Hermione had only spoken to a handful of times as she often left Hermione and Draco alone, seemingly content with their leadership abilities.

“What are you doing in here?”

“You’re being brought to Nurmengard to stand judgment for treason.”

“What!?” Hermione couldn’t believe her ears. Treason? She and Draco had only ever done what was requested of them, braving battles and broken souls to ensure their trap for Tom would be complete.

“It has come to Lord Grindelwald’s attention that you have been in contact with one Albus Dumbledore. Seeing as how Professor Dumbledore is felt to be a significant threat to our efforts, we have no choice but to bring you before our Lord for you to pay the appropriate price.” She lowered her wand a fraction and at last Hermione could make out her harsh features, hawk-like nose overlarge in the shadows cast by the illumination spell. Her paper-thin lips twisted together in silent glee before she offered, “The appropriate price for treason is always death, in case you were wondering. If you are honest, perhaps he will even make it a swift one.”

Her pulse was thundering in her chest, up and down every limb, a raging drum against her temples. It couldn’t be real. Perhaps this was the dream and the pleasantness of before was reality. But she knew better. The sheen of sweat on her brow, the cold wash of acid in her blood. It was all too real. “Who?”

Augusta blinked, an owl on the hunt, predatory and hungry. “Who what, my dear?”

“Who turned me in?”

“So you admit it?” The sinister glee in her dark eyes was enough to make Hermione’s stomach turn an extra time.

“I don’t admit anything,” Hermione ground out, teeth gnashing. “But I deserve to know who my accuser is.”

“Your beau.”

But how could Tom have known she was here? The link with him had been blessedly silent during these months of hell rediscovered. Her Occlumency skills had increased tenfold in the time since they’d arrived at Grindelwald’s farmhouse and they’d continued to practice in the castle and their field tent when the situation would allow. And how would Augusta even know about Tom to begin with? Even Grindelwald had been kept in the dark about the particulars of her relationship with him. Particulars that included that he was her husband and not her boyfriend.

She lifted her confused stare to meet Augusta’s gleeful one. “I don’t understand.”

“Perhaps you should ask him.” With that, Hermione was shoved unceremoniously out of the tent, stumbling to the ground before a pair of scuffed boots she knew as well as her own.

Draco’s hand was oddly firm, too strong and too quick, as he hauled her to stand, her momentum swinging them chest to chest for a moment. His lips found her ear, words tripping over each other as he spoke quickly, “You have to trust me. I’ve researched everything and this is our only option. You have to be guilty, if only for a little while. I’ll explain—”

He cut off abruptly as Augusta took hold of Hermione’s free arm, dragging them apart. “Lover’s spat can wait until after we’re within Grindelwald’s walls, Malfoy.” She tsked, shaking her severe black bun from side to side. “Although I don’t imagine she’ll forgive you for this one. Turning in your lover, that’s harsh even for you. I didn’t realize what sort of darkness lay inside that heart of yours.”

It didn’t matter that they hadn’t kissed since that moment after he’d saved her. It didn’t matter that his soul was blacker than Augusta Devereaux could ever imagine. It didn’t matter that he was breaking her heart right now. No, nothing mattered but the ferocity behind his eyes, the storms that held promises she couldn’t comprehend, but was compelled to trust. She was lost at sea in this awful moment, but he was the lighthouse guiding her to shore.

A different Hermione, one who didn’t know the healing warmth of his hands upon her sore muscles, who hadn’t heard him singing softly beneath his breath to stave off the misery of the night, might have doubted. But she wasn’t the girl whose childhood Voldemort had stolen leaving only a shell behind, or the woman whose body Tom had claimed without permission, her mind a jumbled mess of fiction and reality. She was Hermione Granger, warrior and friend, witch and Muggle. She was all of her scars and yet greater than their sum. So she would have faith despite the evidence and wait and use the strength she’d found bit by bit every night she’d lain across from him, learning to breathe again.

Draco said nothing as he turned his focus to Augusta, but she could see the twitch of his lip, a sure sign he was reining in a nasty sneer. It should have been chilling, but it wasn’t. He didn’t scare her, hadn’t scared her in a very long time. Augusta scowled back at him. “Don’t just stand there, Malfoy. We have places to be, fates to decide.”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” he drawled, the cold disdain dripping over Hermione’s skin like a cracked egg. This time she did tremble, just the slightest bit. She knew it wasn’t real. Hoped to Merlin and Godric it wasn’t real, knew exactly what sort of deceit he was capable of, but still it was the first time she’d heard him like this since they’d arrived in the past and his wand had nearly poked a hole in her jugular.

Augusta rolled her hawkish eyes, but merely pulled Hermione into a crushing embrace. A moment later the tug of apparation threatened to separate her insides from her outsides. If traveling alongside Draco had been nauseating, this was turning it up to eleven and then putting her through a blender for a rotation or two. It was never comfortable, but it rarely was this unpleasant. It reminded her unhappily of the portkey trip to Riddle House, which did nothing for the dread pooling in the pit of her stomach.

They appeared inside the great hall of Nurmengard, a feat Hermione hadn’t known was possible. She forced the observation aside. Now was hardly the time to be analyzing the tactical strengths and weaknesses of Grindelwald’s fortress. She focused on Grindelwald instead. He was seated atop a dais in a chair that very much resembled a throne, hands folded innocuously in his lap beside his wand—the Elder wand if she wasn’t mistaken. His brilliant, sky blue eyes were hard diamonds as they consumed her, dragging across her face, prodding the edges of her mental defenses. She shut him out, slamming her shields into place with relish. If she was going to trust Draco, and right now she had no choice but to trust him, Grindelwald could not see even the barest hint of anything behind her eyes. Her truths were far more valuable than whatever farce they were enacting.

“I’ve been told you know Albus Dumbledore, Ms. Granger.” It was the first time he’d called her anything but Commander in months. “Is this the case?”

Her gaze flickered to Draco. He was immovable as cold marble, lips twisting in an ugly smirk that reminded her of who exactly he’d been. Of who he was still capable of being, if the occasion arose. He held her stare, icy veneer thawing for half a moment as he blinked slowly. His expression was cruel again the next second, foreign and hard. It had been over before it began, but she knew the moment had been deliberate. She knew the depths of his patience, the ability he had to play the game until the bait was taken, no matter the price.

So she said, “Yes. I know Albus Dumbledore.”

Draco’s lips quirked, sneer melting into a half smile that instantly extinguished. “I told you. I intercepted a letter communique between the two of them last night at our tent in the field. Granger here was planning to lead Dumbledore to you before the month was out. She believes he has the power to end you and your campaign.”

Did she now? It was true, from a certain point of view, but it wouldn’t serve their plans for Riddle, so Draco must know she would never invite Dumbledore’s interference. Which meant he was playing a different game here, a game which left her life tenuously suspended in the balance.

Grindelwald seemed to share her doubt. “It was my understanding that destruction of this Riddle boy was the priority for the both of you. You have both upheld your side of our bargain, so I am not sure what Ms. Granger has to gain from my destruction.”

Draco’s jaw twitched and Hermione realized he needed her to sell this deception. In a leap of faith she could hardly justify, she stepped forward, eyes blazing and hackles rising. “I have withstood enough of your crusade against the Muggle world. I will not help you break the Statute of Secrecy and I refuse to help you subjugate the people who raised me. I am a witch and I am proud of it, but I will never hold my power at the expense of another. What you stand for is sick and twisted and I will no longer be your pawn. Tom Riddle isn’t worth this sacrifice of my principles or my soul.”

It would have been easy to say it was all a lie, that she’d gotten going and let the moment get away from her. But as she spoke, she realized the bitter truth hidden behind each biting syllable. She was sick of the senseless violence, the war that stood for everything she’d never believed. Only the bit about Tom didn’t truly resonate, her need for him to pay, for him to lose his precious control until he no longer had the world at his fingertips, far greater than her reluctance to participate in Grindelwald’s seedy agenda.

“So it is treason then.” Grindelwald seemed almost disappointed.

She held his sharp stare, feeling its press against her temple. She let him see the signature of the letter from Dumbledore, the dance they’d shared together at the Yule ball, enough to damn her beyond question. The elder wizard sighed, weary suddenly as he stood from his seat. His steps were slow as he descended toward her, Elder wand spinning between nimble fingers. “You will not recant? I am willing to spare your life, Ms. Granger. You have contributed much to my cause and I do not want to end such a bright light as your own.”

“She is not to be trusted.” Draco’s brittle voice snapped, all hard edges and barely contained violence. “I put my life in her hands, but when she discovered the truth about me, what I did at the behest of the Dark Lord, she forsook me. She’s sent for Dumbledore to destroy me as well, My Lord. I would not leave such a traitor with breath.”

He nearly convinced her of the guilt she did not bear. Where before she’d seen a glimpse of the man she loved, now there was only nebulous darkness, a manifestation of a creature of nightmares, a legend of pain and suffering. If she’d doubted before, she knew now. He might have been coerced into the role, but he had fulfilled it. There was a tremor down her spine that had nothing to do with the rise of the Elder wand or the determined set of Grindelwald’s jaw.

“Then justice shall be served.” His tone was the kind that left echoes in your soul, unyielding as stone, resonant as the wind. “ _Avada Kedavra_.”


	35. Thirty Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all your comments, etc., you all are the best. Most of you have figured out where this is going (for once, a less twisty plot twist), so kudos to all of you. Now, of course, there will be consequences...

~*~ Thirty Five ~*~

Hermione held Draco’s stare as the jet of green shot toward her. He didn’t flinch, but there was a plea within his eyes, a desperate hope that had no place in a room filled with sickly green light. A moment passed, and then there was a rip along the edge of her soul, a tear through the very fabric of her being. Her skin was hot and cold, numb and burning, her heart stopped and racing all at once. It was as if a piece of her was dying, being burned away while the rest of her remained unchanged, entirely unaffected by the killing blow.

But she was screaming. No, he was screaming. The voice in her head, it was not her own. The soul being pulled into the searing depths was no facet of her own. _Tom_. She searched frantically for him, raw emotion clouding out any reservations as a bone-deep need, overwhelming and powerful, spurred her into action. She clawed against the scorching destruction to reach for him, to tighten her hold on him. She would not let him be taken from her. She could not lose this piece of her, no matter how foreign its origin. He had taken everything from her, but he had also given, had imprinted upon her soul, had provided her a companion in the darkness and she would not see his light extinguished so eternally.

Now she was screaming too, a primal yell that echoed through every crevasse of her battered soul. She clung to the shards of him, her light wrapping into his darkness, a mosaic of shattered hopes, forgotten dreams, of a love that hadn’t been. But no matter how much she blanketed him, the fragments of his soul were smote down, the burn searing into the depths of her, every pore aflame, every secret exposed by the green light that crackled beneath her skin.

Then it was silent, the pit of her stomach falling through eternity, the prickle of her nerves the only sign of the battle that had raged within. A metallic tang coated her tongue no matter how many times she swallowed. Her fingers felt as if they’d been scorched, but a glance down at them showed only unbroken skin, so sign of the flames she’d felt.

Nothing had happened; her pulse still fluttered at her throat, her lungs still filled with stale air. And yet everything had changed. She’d felt the moment Tom’s soul turned to ash, could taste it in her mouth, feel it in her lungs. He’d been with her, intertwined to the point she could not tell them apart and then he was gone and she was utterly alone, bereft of a facet she hadn’t understood belonged. She ought to be glad—the Horcrux he’d created within her had been destroyed—but she wasn’t. She was overwhelmed with a grief she had never expected to feel, with a knowledge that Tom meant so much more to her than she’d been willing to acknowledge.

But just because another part of her had cracked didn’t mean the world had stopped turning. It certainly didn’t mean she was excused from the sudden uproar as she rose from the floor, the occupants of the great hall of Nurmengard scrambling back in disbelief.

“What is the meaning of this?” Grindelwald was staring, a hungry look in his eyes that had Hermione taking a step back and then another.

Draco was in front of her instantly, his arm pressing her tightly against his back as he squared his shoulders, wand dropping to his hand. Grindelwald paused, checking his approach to study the sudden transformation of his commander. Draco growled low, the sound vibrating him against her. “You will not harm her.”

“Then you will explain.”

“Privately.”

Grindelwald’s crystalline gaze narrowed, flickering between their faces. Hermione could see the wonder, the incessant need to learn exactly what had protected her from the sure destruction of the Killing Curse. He was a power hungry wizard willing to delve into the darkest of arts and they had just given him proof of one of the blackest magics. Hermione was wrecked from the experience, from the forceful unbinding of her soul from Tom’s, but this could not wait. The gleam in Grindelwald’s eyes was too keen, his hunger too visceral to be denied.

“Fine,” the elder wizard allowed after a charged moment. “Come with me.”

He made a clear show of keeping his wand trained on both of them, indicating with his free hand for them to walk ahead as he directed them down one of the many hallways. The sconces flickered, swept into a frightful dance by the disturbance of air as they moved down the hall, Grindelwald’s pace a frantic walk that had her stumbling more than once, only Draco’s secure arm at her waist keeping her upright. They made a handful of turns she couldn’t remember before stopping outside an arched doorway. Grindelwald moved his wand in a complex unlocking spell and the door fell away revealing a small sitting room with a vast array of windows illuminated by the brilliant orange of the dawn. Draco led Hermione to one of the wing-backed chairs, settling to lean against the arm as Grindelwald finished resetting his locking charm. Collapsing into the chair, Hermione let her hand settle on the armrest, letting out a breath of relief as Draco clasped it, his fingers weaving seamlessly through hers.

“Explain.” Gleeful and imperious, the word echoed through the room.

Draco’s grip tightened, but his voice was deceptively level, bored even. “I needed you to eliminate the soul fragment of another person that had been placed in Hermione. To do so required the use of the Killing Curse and a pure intent to cause her death. I was… unable to do the task myself for that reason. Hence the fabrication of Hermione’s treason. I do apologize for the charade. I know it will be difficult to explain.”

“Difficult to explain?” Grindelwald crowed. “It is impossible to explain. No one survives the Killing Curse. Not a single soul and now I have a traitor without a scratch on her at the receiving end of my wand. A wand that does not lose.”

“It didn’t,” Hermione interjected. “The part of Tom’s soul inside me had to be eliminated before you could kill me. The magic in your wand worked properly and destroyed a soul as requested. It just wasn’t mine.”

“Tom?” Grindelwald’s keen intellect didn’t miss her admission. “As in Tom Riddle. What was a piece of the soul of the man you want to kill doing inside you?” He paused, Elder wand lowering to dangle at his side as he slid into a chair across from her. “What magic is this? This splitting of souls and survival of curses? I feel as if I’ve heard of it or something very similar before. Let me think… yes, back when Dumbledore and I were friends, before the tragedy, I recall a discussion about some very dark magic indeed. Magic so black it withered the soul, but preserved the body. An eternal life, but at the highest price, the very essence of one’s soul.”

An apropos description of a Horcrux if she’d ever heard one. Draco shifted beside her, his jaw tensing. “So you know.”

“Of Horcruxes?” There was a pleased gleam in his eyes that grew as they both tensed at the word. “Yes. I am not such a fool as to believe they would work. Power is useful, a means to an end, but it only benefits a wizard if there is still a fully functional mind and body to use it. From what research I’ve done, Horcruxes seemed useful only in the direst of situations where they were the only way to prevent the destruction of the soul in its entirety. And still, if one’s body were to be destroyed, it would take dark magics indeed to provide a sufficient host. Even still, it’s likely the mind and body would never truly fit together as intended and that the power sought would never be fully attainable in such a compromised form.”

An astute conclusion based on what had happened to Voldemort following his desperate resurrection. Draco seemed to agree, nodding beside her. The dawn’s light had painted his platinum hair a blazing bronze, its fine strands like a dancing fire as he carded his hand through it. “The effects are quite similar to what you surmised. But it’s much worse if the soul has been fractured more than once.”

Grindelwald froze, icy blue eyes widening to a nearly comic degree. “And how many times has this Riddle boy split his soul?”

“At present, only two,” Hermione admitted.

“But in the future,” Draco continued, features twisting in clear disgust. “Seven.”

“No wonder he becomes less sane,” Grindelwald reflected, clearly remembering his conversation with Draco in the farmhouse bedroom. “So he’s terrified of death, but why use a human vessel? Ms. Granger is very much mortal. And don’t think you’re off the hook, Ms. Granger. Those memories I saw of you and my former friend were very real indeed.”

Hermione took the statement in stride. Her relationship with Dumbledore could easily be explained if she showed him any one of her memories of the future. As well as the true content of the letter she’d received. It seemed Grindelwald was more fascinated by her knowledge of Horcruxes, including her stint as one, to be concerned with killing her any longer. Any punishment would likely be a method to pacify his followers who’d witnessed her impossible survival than anything truly endangering her.

Draco took a half step forward, stormy eyes alit, the sunrise turning his irises radiant. “You will not harm her.”

“So you’ve said before. I am impressed, Mr. Malfoy, by your affinity for deception. I would not have killed, or attempted to kill I suppose we should say, Ms. Granger if I had not been convinced you felt she was a danger to yourself and others within my walls. Of course, it helps that you played the part, Ms. Granger. Your anger was rather palpable. I’m afraid I will no longer be able to allow either of you the liberty of leading my forces.” Hermione’s pulse leapt, the consequences of Draco’s deception coming into focus for the first time since she’d risen to her feet in the great hall, the harrowing imprint of Tom’s charred soul burned into her forever. But Grindelwald, waved a hand a both of them, a smile tugging at his lips. “I will not be abandoning our deal, my dear time travelers, merely altering it. But I still have questions and you will provide me with answers.”

“Of course, my Lord,” Draco assured, his stance relaxing a hair.

“Neither of you answered me. Why did Ms. Granger have Tom Riddle’s soul in her?” His gaze was sharp now, unrelenting as he crashed against her mental barriers.

Draco’s eyes slid down to meet hers, a question behind them. It was her secret to share, but he would if she was unable to face it. She swallowed heavily, metallic burn still coating her tongue. This was her burden to bear and she would not shirk it. “Tom Riddle and I… we were close. So close we were married.” At this, Grindelwald’s brows shot upward, her words clearly not the explanation he’d expected. “Tom’s twisted idea of a wedding gift, or something like that, was to tie us together eternally. He made me a Horcrux after killing his father after our wedding.”

The elder wizard blinked slowly, as if he could not quite believe her. “And you willingly tied yourself to such a man?”

“It’s complicated.” And it was. The death of Tom’s soul within her today had made that abundantly clear. She’d thought she was over him, that the months of healing spent with Draco had changed her, allowed her to morph into a different woman, a woman unshackled by Tom’s memory. Clearly she’d been mistaken. All it had taken was a threat against him and she’d thrown herself without thought or reason into the path of destruction. If anything, she was lucky the devastating green light hadn’t chosen her instead, as often as she’d tried to block it from reaching Tom. She knew that within the murky depths of her soul ties to him still lurked, that she was attached to him in ways she couldn’t square with what he’d done to her, but actively fighting for him was something she’d promised never to do again. Her skin crawled as she realized how little she understood of her connection to him still. He was deeper in her psyche than she’d imagined and purging him was clearly no simple matter.

Draco’s hand on her shoulder, strong and warm brought her back. She let her head fall against the touch, his rough skin against her cheek. He didn’t pull away. “Is that all?” The question was directed toward Grindelwald, but she could feel his eyes on her.

“Until I can determine how best to handle the mess you have created, I suppose so. We are not finished discussing this matter, however. I would know the intricacies of this magic. Do not worry, I have no designs to use such destructive magics on myself, but I find greater understanding is always beneficial.”

Hermione had no idea whether or not to trust him, but they had little choice now. Draco gently squeezed her shoulder and it took all her self control not to collapse against him, to yield to the exhaustion that threatened to steal her away now that the imminent threat had passed. “We’ll retire to our rooms until you decide our fate.”

“That would be appreciated.” Grindelwald’s gaze sliced through her before cutting up settle on Draco. “You both have created quite the mess for me today.”

“I’m sorry, my Lord.” But for once the blond didn’t sound sorry at all.

The fact was not lost on Grindelwald. “Do not think you haven’t shown your true colors today, Mr. Malfoy. Do not think for one second I do not know the rank deception of which you are capable. Tread carefully while you are dependent on my charity.”

Draco’s grip on her shoulder tightened and his next words were pure deference. “I apologize, my Lord. I will not forget.”

“Leave.”

They didn’t need to told twice. Even though Hermione was toeing the edge of complete exhaustion, she surged to her feet, swaying against Draco, but moving steadily toward the exit. It was only after they’d safely turned down the hall that she allowed her steps to falter, her body to succumb to the trauma it had endured. The world spun, off kilter and impossible, but then warm hands were around her legs and she was floating, warm and safe. The corridor fizzled and faded, the darkness that followed a welcome relief.


	36. Thirty Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So good to hear from so many of you, both new and old. Thanks for taking a chance on a story may not have seemed exactly what you were looking for. I think a good story should always be more than it appears and I hope this one can live up to that standard.
> 
> WARNINGS: sexual content.

~*~ Thirty Six ~*~

Hermione’s head pounded like a hippogriff was dancing on her temples, the serenity of sleep chased away by the throbbing. She slowly rose to a sitting position, noting the soft sheets that brushed across her mostly bare skin. Her trousers and boots had been removed, leaving only her underclothes and a t-shirt that was several sizes too big and smelled vaguely of mint and cedar. She was too tired to care that Draco had undressed her; wasn’t sure she would care even if exhaustion didn’t cling to her like a second skin. Wasn’t sure what she felt toward him at all. In mere minutes, he’d changed everything, forced her to endure a pain and humiliation she’d been unprepared to face. Yet he’d done it for her, for them, for the whole bloody world. But Tom’s soul burning within her hadn’t felt like freedom; it had felt like unmitigated destruction, cruel and unnecessary.

Groaning, she swung her legs to the side, the stone floor cool against her feet. She padded silently from her bedroom, stopping at the loo to wash her face and relieve herself. Significantly more comfortable, she wandered into their shared sitting room, surprised to find the main room empty. She distinctly remembered an irritated Grindelwald asking them to stay put. Fingers trailing absently over the ornate embroidery of the sofa, she turned her focus to the balcony. The sun was high in the summer sky now, its brilliant light washing over the pale gray stone, making the fine crystals within the grain glitter. Draco stood, shirtless, bronzed skin gleaming, his elbows resting on the elaborate stone banister as he stared out into the cerulean sky. A loose pair of black trousers hung on his slim hips, but his feet were also bare, the heat of the day clear in the sheen of sweat that glistened on his exposed skin.

She’d always assumed he was permanently pale, that his alabaster complexion was genetic instead of environmental. Their months on the road had proved her wrong quickly, his ashen pallor growing into a healthy glow as the months passed. Now it was difficult to reconcile the man that stood before her with the pale ghost he’d been during their time at Hogwarts, both recently and as children. She knew Astoria had died mere weeks before they’d met atop the tower, but she hadn’t realized how unhealthy he’d been, how lost they’d both been.

Sensing her gaze, he turned, but didn’t approach, choosing instead to lean back against the stone, expression inscrutable. Hermione stepped out into the light, sighing in appreciation as the warmth of the stone melted into her feet, the rays of the sun instantly heating her exposed skin. Draco tilted his head, platinum strands dancing over his shoulders at the movement. He hadn’t cut his hair and now it hung loose below his shoulders, although he often braided it, the look somehow masculine despite the style. She supposed he could probably weave flowers into it and still be toe-curlingly handsome, all strong angles and sculpted muscles.

“How are you feeling?”

Like she’d survived the Killing Curse. Like she wished she didn’t remember every agonizing detail of fighting for Tom’s soul. “Tired.”

“Yeah. You’ve been asleep for two days, on and off. I can’t imagine what that must have been like.” There wasn’t quite remorse in those tempestuous eyes, but something close. “I didn’t want it to go down like that, but…”

But there hadn’t been a better way. She understood the logic, the reason, the choices, but that didn’t mean their reality wasn’t painful. “Did you know? Did you know I would survive?”

He stared at her a long moment, eyes tracing the shape of her face over and over. “I prayed you would.”

“You told me you couldn’t lose me.”

“I was definitely going to lose you if I didn’t do this.” He scrubbed a hand over his face, voice cracking as he continued. “I…I couldn’t… there was no good option, Hermione. I was there when Voldemort hit Potter with the Killing Curse that day, I saw him move his hand before he went over the parapets. So I hoped, used whatever was left of my faith, to bargain that you would survive too.”

“But you turned me in as a traitor. Why not kill me yourself?”

He blinked, expression shattering into horror. “Do you really think me such a monster, even still? The killing curse requires absolute conviction, the desire for another person to end and never come back. I love you. There’s no way I could ever cast a successful curse like that at you. Plus the Elder wand seemed the best wand at our disposal for such purposes.”

He’d said as much before, but it mollified her to hear it again. He had betrayed her, but he had done it with love in his heart. She still wasn’t sure how to parse the complexity of that. “Why not tell me the plan? I would have agreed if you’d only told me.”

“I couldn’t ask you to die.” He turned back to the scarps jutting into the azure sky. “I couldn’t look you in eye and tell you I knew you’d survive either. So I didn’t tell you anything at all.”

“I trusted you.” It was an accusation, a plea, a curse.

He swung back around, jaw tense and gaze consuming. “I know and I don’t expect your forgiveness. I manipulated you, forced you into a life or death situation without your consent. For that I am sorry. I am not sorry he’s no longer inside you.”

A sentiment she couldn’t quite agree with. But that was another matter and not a trauma of Draco’s making. “What if I had died?”

He jerked, as if struck, his mouth dropping open, moving silently. Finally, he whispered, “Then it would have been over.”

“Over?”

“Done. I’d have found Riddle, dragged him here and killed him. After that, I would have been done, free to…”

His silence spoke volumes. He would have killed Tom and then found a way to escape this mortal coil. With the man who had taken both of the women he’d loved dead, his reason to fight would be gone. Hermione’s heart dropped, adrenaline flooding her veins as the reality of his words continued to cut into her. Whatever doubts and resentments she’d had fractured as she closed the distance between them. Draco melted into her, his damp skin hot against her frantic hands.

“I’m sorry. You scared me. There were moments I wasn’t sure trusting you was the right decision.” It was the truth. She still felt the echo of doubt, a product of his deception, but she also felt the bolt of terror that had run through her at the prospect of his suicide, at the realization that he had nothing to live for beyond Tom’s demise without her in his life. They were both so very broken.

“I don’t ever want to scare you again,” he whispered against her hair, arms tightening around her. “I hated doing that… it reminded me of everything I try to forget. Of the crimes I will never wash away, of the truth that I deserve this.” He pulled back to indicate his leg, his eyes alight with a frenzied loathing that took her breath way. “I deserve every second of this pain, every loss. Astoria didn’t deserve to die, but I deserved to lose her.”

“Don’t say that.” The words sounded small, pathetic.

“You don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t know the truth of the monster I became.” His eyes were twin pits of misery, hell made manifest. He staggered back from her, tearing away from her desperate grip. “I’m the vilest of them all. There is no forgiveness for my sins, no absolution for my guilt. Nor should there be.”

Hermione stared at him, hands limp by her sides, words dying in quick succession in her throat. She wanted to tell him it was okay, to say it would get better, that their world would change and they’d grow old and die together happily ever after. But it wouldn’t. He could never undo what he had done. Draco was right; the blood on his hands would never wash away and he would live with the horror every day for the rest of their lives.

“I love you.” It was the only thing she could say. Everything else was a lie, paper thin platitudes that meant nothing.

“You really shouldn’t.”

“I have a habit of falling for people I shouldn’t.”

“Falling?” The tempests in his eyes were suddenly still, the misery evaporating like summer rain.

Her teeth worried her bottom lip for a long moment before she let the words tumble out. “Falling, like falling in love.”

“In love? I thought you said—”

“I lied. I lied to myself and to you. I was terrified—I still am—and I couldn’t take the risk.” Hermione stepped into him, hands sliding over the sculpted muscles of his torso, the bronzed skin twitching at her touch. “I can’t tell you some part of me isn’t still stuck on Tom. When Grindelwald cast that spell, I fought for his soul, Draco. I fought for a boy who used me, who destroyed me because I can’t eradicate him from my psyche. And I’m terrified of what that means for me. And I’m terrified of you. You, this man who’s capable of such darkness, but who has only ever saved me, even when I fought you tooth and nail. You, who love me more than I have ever been loved. You, who can destroy me, who can make Tom’s scars seem like mere scratches.”

His heart was beating frantically beneath her palm. He ducked his head, his face now a breath away, his lips hovering over hers. “I can’t promise this will end well.”

She couldn’t either. They couldn’t promise each other anything beyond love and they both knew that wasn’t enough. But she didn’t care. “I’m tired of fighting this, Draco. I’m tired of fighting everything, of holding on to nothing but ghosts.”

Hermione didn’t know which of them moved first, only that their lips were fused, the heat of his chest burning through the material of her shirt. Her hands twined in his hair, nails scraping the base of his skull. He moaned, mouth opening over hers, tongue trailing the seam of her lips. She parted them for him with a soft sigh, shuddering as he nipped at them before delving further into the heat of her mouth, his tongue chasing hers. Her skin was aflame, flushed beyond the heat of the day. He shifted, pulling her upward in a fluid movement that left her legs wrapped securely around his hips, the evidence of his arousal insistent against her. She ground down on him as her fingers dug into the hard muscles of his shoulders. He growled into her mouth as he retreated from the balcony to the sitting room, lips never leaving hers.

Hermione was panting by the time he deposited her on the sofa, deft hands removing his shirt from her frame in mere seconds. His lips curved in a delicious smile, bruised and oh so inviting as he lowered to feather kisses over the slope of her stomach and then the curve of her breast, breath hot against her sensitive skin. He retreated a moment to unfasten her bra and she whined at the loss of contact, earning her a roguish grin. The whine broke into a moan as he captured one of her breasts with his mouth, rolling her nipple playfully across his tongue. He repeated the treatment on her other breast, fingers reverently skimming the line of her knickers. He knelt before her, gently guiding her legs apart as his mouth moved down, worshiping every millimeter of her skin as he went.

Her eyes were hazy with pleasure, but the feeling was deeper, the sensation more than she remembered. This was nothing like the escape she’d chased with Harry or the desperation with which she’d clung to Tom. It was deeper, something innate within her bones understanding pleasure was only a facet of the experience. The way Draco touched her, like she was precious, like she was the only thing in the entire world, made her shiver, her legs quake from more than the mere movement of his mouth upon her skin. It wasn’t only his lips that were giving her pleasure; it was him. It was this broken man who had nothing loving her despite his failures, despite their lives and their decisions. He was taking her world and shattering it, but unlike so many before him, he was picking up the pieces as he went, coaxing her into something stronger, something less barren and desolate. Merlin, just the look in his eyes was nearly enough to send her cascading over the edge and he hadn’t even truly touched her yet.

When he finally did pull Hermione to her feet and guide them to a bedroom, her thighs were slick with desire and her heart was nearly bursting out of her chest. Draco settled her onto the bed, hand trailing over her flushed cheek as he backed away. “Before we do this, you need to know a few things.”

“Okay.”

He nodded, swallowing. “The actual act of intercourse can be painful for me… because of the curse. There are a couple positions I know that are fine, but I have to be careful.”

Her chest tightened, an ache settling in her gut. Of course. She knew how severe the injury was, how debilitating it could be for him. “I’ll do whatever you need me to do. And I’ll be careful.”

A shadow of relief passed over his face, full lips relaxing at her words. “Thank you.”

“I love you, Draco. You’re not going to scare me off because you’re human and feel pain.” Hermione reached out for him and he closed the distance, eyes brimming with emotion. She placed a solemn kiss on the inside of his wrist. “I will never judge you for this pain. I wish I could take it away, but I will never think less of you because of it. It doesn’t matter what we can’t do. I want to be with you in any way I can, just tell me how.”

His eyes were calm, but limned with moisture as he pressed a soft kiss to her temple. “I don’t deserve you.”

“I don’t give a shit about what you deserve,” she murmured. “Now teach me how to love you.”

He laughed, the sound light and airy, pure delight. “Well, if you insist, Ms. Granger.”

“Technically it’s Mrs. Riddle.” The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them, before their utter inappropriateness had reached her brain.

Draco merely cocked a brow. “Then I shall very much enjoy making a cuckold of Mr. Riddle.”

Hermione let out the breath she’d been holding. “I certainly hope so.”

“Now come here.”

He sat at the head of the bed and beckoned her closer, sinful smirk twisting his swollen lips. She crawled to him, enjoying the heat behind his hungry stare. His fingers were at the edge of her knickers as soon as she reached him, divesting her of the item with haste. Holding his smoldering stare, she worked the ties of his pants. He helped her lower them and his underclothes a moment later, both of them taking care to avoid touching his left thigh.

His arousal suspended between them now, Hermione reached forward, taking him firmly into her grasp, drinking in the soft gasps of his pleasure as she stroked him. Draco’s eyes were hooded, bleary with need as he stilled her hand.

“I want to be inside you.”

She trembled, grip spasming. He moaned in response before guiding her to straddle him, thighs resting on the taut muscles of his abdomen. Full mouth gasping in pleasure, he tenderly gripped her hips as he lowered her onto him, slow enough she ached for more even as he continued her decent. When she finally rested against him, filled to the hilt, they began to move. At first he kept full control of their thrusts, guiding her with his hands, but also letting her adjust, letting the pace and angle evolve as she explored the sensation between them. Soon he was letting go, drawing her down to capture her mouth with his, to tangle his dexterous fingers in her hair, to worship of the column of her throat.

She lost herself in the glide of him within her, in the relentless reverence of his touch. His hands were everywhere at once, coaxing pleasure from every corner of her body, shaping her into something fresh and new. She dropped over the edge so many times she lost count and by the time he spilled within her, she was boneless and sated, trembling with a pleasure that was far more than the visceral.

Draco turned a wolfish grin upon her, his bronzed skin gleaming, begging her to run her hands across the contours of him. She didn’t resist. His grin merely grew. “I told you it was better when it was about love.”

She could hardly argue now. Whatever possessive ritual she’d shared with Tom seemed a pale reflection of what had just happened. For so long sexual pleasure had merely been an escape, but now she wanted to be here, to remember every moment with Draco, to live in the moment and remember it.

_Too bad you forgot about your shielding, my dearest wife. Or rather, my adulterous wife._

Hermione screamed, hands flying to her head as she flew off the bed. The Horcrux was gone. He was supposed to be gone. “Get out of my head!”

Draco was by her side in an instant, ignoring the clear pain that followed the sudden movement. “What’s happening? Hermione?”

“Tom’s here.”

_Tell that bastard I’m going to kill him for touching my wife. I’m going to tear him to pieces and let you watch, and I won’t end his suffering until you’re begging for me again._ She could almost see Tom standing beside her, teeth gnashing and cobalt eyes dark with rage.

“Occlumency, Hermione!” Draco’s stern command cut through the horror of Tom’s threat. “You can control this. You’ve controlled it for months.”

_It’s too late, my dearest wife. I know where you are and I am coming for you. Don’t you dare touch him again if you want his suffering to be brief._ The connection cut off abruptly and Hermione was able to concentrate enough to snap her shields into place.

Voice shaking, she murmured, “He’s gone, for now. But he knows, Draco. He knows where we are.”

“Then we prepare. Grindelwald has promised to uphold our deal even after what I did.” He pulled her to him, wrapping his arms tightly around her trembling body. “He will not get to you, I promise.”

“He wants to torture you, then kill you.” The moment didn’t seem real, juxtaposed against the intimacy they’d shared mere moments before.

“Nothing he hasn’t already done to me.”

“You’re not dead, Draco,” she argued. “Whatever Voldemort had against you before, it's nothing compared to what Tom feels now. He not only knows where we are, but he also felt what we just did. And the fact that he could get in my head? That means there’s something besides the Horcrux binding us together, like you suspected.”

“I know.” Draco cupped her cheeks, thumb brushing away tears she hadn’t known were falling. “I know. But we’re going to get through this. I promised Astoria and I promise you, I will end him.”

Hermione didn’t know if the solemn vow reassured her or not, but she leaned into his touch, surrendering to the feeling of safety and security he evoked.


	37. Thirty Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple things. First, many of you have sent such kind words my direction, so thank you. Every bit of your feedback is valued and appreciated. 
> 
> Second, I am occasionally reminded by some unkind words that we need to remember than fanfiction is simply for fun. Yes, I am putting a lot of myself into this story (discussed a bit below), but I am not expecting it to be everyone's cup of tea. That's the awesome thing about this world, there are so many stories, so many writing styles, nearly an infinite number of choices. I would ask that we all remember to be kind to one another and to display decency and respect as we navigate through these written gems. Not every one will be the diamond in the rough for all of us, after all. I never mind feedback that is critical as long as it is respectful and I think that would be true for most authors. I was a high school teacher for several years and I've built up a bit of thick skin when it comes to being insulted and called names, but that doesn't mean I'm not human inside. So go kindly into this online world and into the world beyond your door.
> 
> I wanted to also take the time to talk about Draco's conversation with Hermione about pain before they made love in the previous chapter. I felt it was very important to address pain in relationship to sex. For me, pain is the most limiting factor when it comes to intimacy and the amount of shame and inadequacy that truth generates is sometimes unbearable. I mean, it's a basic human function that I am unable to perform on a whim because of the pain I experience (my pain is isolated to my pelvic region). I feel I miss out on so much because of this and it just plain sucks. For Draco, it's not quite so debilitating, but I wanted to increase awareness of this issue and to show you the depths of trust and vulnerability those of us who suffer like this must share with our partners. 
> 
> Okay, on to something pretty full of feels...
> 
> WARNINGS: Graphic descriptions of torture

~*~ Thirty Seven ~*~

Grindelwald made them wait a week. A week of doubt. A week of Tom edging ever closer to the Austrian fortress. A week of discovering all the facets she could of Draco Malfoy. Despite the impending doom, the uncertainty of their future, let alone their future together, she found the days in purgatory calming. They’d been on the run and then in the midst of war together, but they’d never had the time to breathe, to know what it felt like to wake in each other’s arms, to let gentle hands caress bare skin in the sultry heat of the day. They hadn’t wasted a minute, exploring the depths of the other with hunger, hands learning every contour, mouths every taste.

But it wasn’t a hazy, lust-fueled escape. There was sex, but it was deliberate, its purpose to bring them closer together, to claim access to the depths of his soul that she couldn’t find without him buried deep inside of her. Every touch was emblazoned with love, every passionate whisper a declaration and a promise. He taught her the true language of love, a far more shattering vocabulary than the empty desire she’d known.

Her body had grown lethargic, accustomed to luxurious caresses on balmy nights, lazy days of simply sitting together, observing the defiant alps conquer the azure sky, listening to the tittering calls of the native birds. She knew Tom was coming, that Grindelwald still held their fate in his devious hands, but she couldn’t bring herself to care when Draco was beside her.

Hermione sighed, relaxing further into his bare chest, head resting carefully away from his cursed leg as she used him as a pillow. She could feel his gaze settle on her, blood rushing to the surface at the intensity of his stare. His hand traced a line of molten fire down her jaw.

“You’re beautiful.”

She canted her head to look up at him, his hand falling to her neck. “I don’t—”

“You are,” Draco insisted, voice rough, a warning in his stormy eyes. “I don’t care what you think. You are completely breathtaking and I can’t believe I lasted this long without giving in to you.”

A wry smile fell across her lips as she broke their charged stare. “I’m pretty sure I was the one holding out, not you. And you used to make fun of my hair and my teeth…”

She was only teasing, but his abs tensed beneath her, hand cupping her chin to return her focus to him. “I was an idiot.”

“I don’t hold it against you, Draco. Not for a long time now.”

He searched her face, tempests going quiet at whatever he found there. When he spoke, there was a teasing undertone she’d not heard before. “You did look a lot better after Madam Pomfrey fixed your teeth.”

Gasping in mock horror, Hermione pushed upward enough to land a hard blow to his shoulder. He merely laughed, unfazed by the minor violence. She had the childish urge to grab his hair, currently falling enticingly across his bronzed skin, and tug. So she did. He yelped, scowling as he scrambled out of her reach.

“Merlin, that actually hurt!”

She grinned up at him before collapsing in a fit of giggles. “You scream like a girl.”

His gaze went murderous, but in the way that made her stomach flip and her skin flush. Draco was on her a second later, hands digging into her flesh in all the sensitive places. Her laughter grew to a fever pitch, but his tickling didn’t abate. Her chest hurt, the very act of breathing difficult, but she didn’t want him to stop. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so carefree, so untethered to the grim reality that had become her life.

Of course, that had to be the moment Grindelwald found them, sweeping into the room with imperious flare only to stop short at the sight of their partially clothed bodies entangled, laughter spilling from their lips. He cleared his throat, but it still took a moment for Draco to stop, for Hermione’s brain to regain enough function to understand she needed to stop howling like a hyena. Draco recovered first, drawing back to stare at Grindelwald with an unrepentant scowl.

Hermione pushed up from her spot on the sofa, tugging Draco’s black t-shirt further down her bare thighs. Realizing her state of undress was more inappropriate than his, Draco tactfully passed her a blanket that had fallen on the floor.

Her legs now fully concealed, he turned back to Grindelwald, arms crossed and brow raised. “I take it you’ve determined our fate, my Lord.”

“I have,” the elder wizard replied, distaste still etched on his severe features. “Although I have to say I am surprised by how the two of you have chosen to spend your time.”

“What we do behind closed doors is absolutely none of your business.” Draco’s reply was frosty at best. “Get to the point.”

The other man glared with a bit more venom, but continued. “Because of what I have learned about you, and that includes your duplicitous nature, Malfoy, as well as the full extent of your knowledge of the Dark Arts, I am unable to release you from my custody. You are a danger to this time and letting you go would be irresponsible of me.”

Whatever endorphins their laughter had spawned were purged by the cascade of terror that trembled down her spine. “What?”

Grindelwald’s focus shifted to her. “I will help you when Mr. Riddle inevitably finds my front door, but I will not allow you or Mr. Malfoy back into my time or my world. The knowledge you have is too critical.”

“To you,” Draco accused, the line of his spine rigid. Hermione laid a hand on his back, stroking the tense muscles. He relaxed a fraction before continuing, “You have no right to hold us here.”

“You gave up your rights when you decided to leave your own time and change the course of history, Mr. Malfoy. Such feats should generally not be attempted. And if they are, must be done with the utmost caution.” The condescension in his tone set her teeth grinding as Draco’s hands tightened into fists at his sides.

“Yet you would kill the man who would kill you,” she pointed out, words nearly spat into the space between them.

“Perhaps I should put this differently as it seems the moral argument is not to your taste. I have the power here, Ms. Granger, and I will always have the power because I have the instrument to ensure it.” His smile was cruel now, the first true sign she’d seen of the madness she’d been told existed within him. Perhaps there was no way to embrace the Dark Arts without succumbing to its thrall. Her gaze slid to the trembling of Draco’s fists. Had it touched him too?

She shook her head, clearing away the thought. It didn’t matter right now. “The Elder wand can be won from you.”

Grindelwald blinked, unable to contain his surprise, but he recovered quickly, sneer chasing away all signs of the emotion. “Your knowledge won’t help you this time, Ms. Granger. I am aware of the limitations of my wand, but it is hardly the only thing that gives me power. I will have what’s inside that pretty little head of yours.”

Draco’s snarl reverberated through her as he lunged, closing the distance to Grindelwald in the blink of an eye. His hands were in the wizard’s robes, violent and unyielding as he ground out, “You don’t know what I’m capable of, Gellert. Speak to her like that again and I’ll leave you in pieces, no matter how much we might need you to capture Riddle.”

Eye twitching, Grindelwald peeled Draco’s fingers from his person. “I am the most powerful wizard in this room, Malfoy.”

“But I’m the most ruthless,” Draco hissed, still a hair’s breadth from the other man. “As you’ve learned, I’m a master at deception. But that’s not the only skill I perfected during my time with Lord Voldemort.”

It was the first time she’d heard him say the honorific and the name together and it packed a punch she didn’t expect. To hear it reminded her of so much she wished could be forgotten, of paralyzing fear and infinite loss, of the darkness beneath her skin and the certainty of Draco’s crimes. Grindelwald had no such reaction, merely curling his lip as he said, “I don’t fear you, boy.”

“Perhaps you should.” Hermione’s voice cut across the room, making Draco turn to look at her, stare brimming with chaos. “There are stories the Order would tell, to make sure new recruits fell in line, to make them understand how dark our war had become. They were stories of a man with a talent for pain, with the patience to destroy, one drop of blood at a time. They said he took your soul with him and by the time he was done, not even your corpse was recognizable. They said you begged for death for weeks, months, and that the end never came, not until you’d given up every last secret hidden inside, not until you were as inhuman as he.” Her focus left Draco’s angular features, the swell of agony behind his eyes, to find Grindelwald. “They weren’t stories.”

The elder wizard held her stare and she let a memory of one of Moody’s more horrific tales float to the surface. She could feel the moment he took the bait, the moment he understood just how dark Draco Malfoy was. He turned back to Draco abruptly. “You are in violation of wizarding law in every country for this… escapade through time. After we have confronted this Tom Riddle of yours, we will revisit the terms of our agreement.”

“Get out.” Draco’s voice was brittle, ice on the verge of cracking.

“This isn’t over, Ms. Granger, Mr. Malfoy.”

“Nothing ever is,” Hermione replied, mouth acrid and bitter.

The door slammed shut behind the departing wizard, but neither Hermione nor Draco moved. She couldn’t see his face; he was angled toward the balcony now, silhouette dark against the bright afternoon light. She let the blanket drop away from her lap after the minutes had stretched too far and the terror within her chest had grown too large. She put one foot in front of the other, slowly closing the gap between them.

“Don’t.”

His strangled plea stopped her instantly. The tightness in her chest ratcheted up, her hands beginning to shake at her sides. “I didn’t mean…”

“Yes, you did.”

He still wouldn’t look at her. She swallowed, heavy and wrong. “I wanted him to back off.” It wasn’t an excuse; it was simply the truth. Grindelwald had threatened to take their freedom away and she had fought back. But she hadn’t thought about the impact her words would have on him, on the pernicious truth she’d once again unearthed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

At this he spun around, handsome features cleaved by devastation. “You’re sorry? You have nothing to apologize for, Hermione. You have done nothing wrong. I am the monster here, not you.”

“I forgive you.”

“No, you don’t.”

She didn’t know which of them was right. She wanted to forgive him, to absolve him of the horrors he’d perpetrated, but they were not her wrongs to forgive. She’d never been one of his victims, had never known pain at his hands, had never been broken by him until she was a mess of flesh and unhinged memory. She likely had no idea the extent of his sins and yet, she still wanted to chase the suffering from his turbulent eyes, to tell him he deserved her love no matter what he’d done.

“I…” but words failed her now, as he stared down at her with only pain, harsh and undeniable, contorting his face, his eyes, his soul.

“I swore I would never tell you,” he bit out, low and wretched. “I swore. I never told her. I kept that vow at least.”

She realized what he was saying, what he was about to do. The air swept from her lungs in an instant leaving her breathless and stumbling. He didn’t attempt to steady her as she tumbled backward onto the couch below. He merely kept dull eyes, storms eerily absent, focused somewhere to the left of her face.

“It started with the Cruciatus, as all torture does. That was easy. You don’t get out of the snake pit without learning how to do that one. Then it was darker spells, some that Snape had crafted for him, some of his imagination, eventually some of my own creation. They made your blood boil, your mind believe your limbs were being severed, your skin cook from the inside out, your lungs collapse at will. We took apart the human body and found a million ways to cause every facet of it pain.

“Then there was the humiliation, the prisoners smeared in feces and drenched in urine, their spilt blood a mere afterthought of bodily fluid.” He paused, lips drawn thin. Draco swallowed, once, then again, before continuing. “They would scream for days, weeks even, before their throats would finally give out, before we could no longer pry every truth, before they’d lost every last dreg of their dignity. Then he’d let the more lecherous Death Eaters at them. They were more corpse than human by then, but they could still shake with pain as those men took their bodies in ways that should never be experienced. I never participated in those violations, but I watched, I condoned. I might have been saving my wife, but I was damning those poor, wretched souls to a fate far worse than death. I never even killed them when I had the chance. He would have known and even the barest hint of mercy would have damned me.

“But that’s what I didn’t understand, you see? I was already damned. I’d been damned the first moment I lifted my wand for him, to save my mother, when I was sixteen and scared shitless. The moment I chose the security of those I loved, I also chose him and it was over for me. I told myself I was fighting for good people, but you don’t turn yourself into the heart of evil just to spare a single soul, you don’t let yourself bathe in blood just so your wife can live another day.” He finally looked at her and all she saw was acerbic truth. “You can choose now, but I doubt forgiveness is on your lips.”

She wiped at the silent tears that had escaped as he spoke, her heart cracking with every tortured word he uttered. She’d heard, had known, had imagined, but still it cut through her, tearing down every belief she’d built of him. But she fought the horror, the revulsion crawling just beneath her skin. He was everything he described and likely more, but he was also the boy whose laughter had echoed off the walls less than an hour before. He was guilty, so guilty she ached at the depth of it, but he was also a victim of Voldemort’s madness. To a much lesser extent than the lives he had destroyed, for sure, but undeniably a victim still.

“I still love you,” she managed to murmur. “I’m still in love with you.”

“Did you hear a word I said?”

“Yes. I heard every damn word you bloody said, Draco.” She palmed away her tears, rising to her feet to stand before him. “I heard it all. But I am neither judge, jury nor executioner. You will never be on trial with me. My love isn’t contingent on who you have been, merely who you are now. And right now, Draco Malfoy, you are a good man.”

“I…”

Draco trailed off, clearly unsure of himself, of the new weight of truth suspended between them, of her unrelenting declaration. She closed the distance between them, flinging her arms around his stiff frame, pulling him against her with all her strength. “You have to live with it, just like I have to live with my marriage to Tom. It gains us nothing to endlessly berate ourselves for such poor choices. And that’s what they were, poor choices made with the best of intentions. I’m not saying that’s any sort of absolution, but it’s true. We are more than the sum of our pasts. I have to believe that.”

He dropped his forehead to rest against hers, and she cupped his cheek, the moisture of his tears smearing between them. “I don’t know how to live with this, Hermione. I don’t want to live with this.”

“We’re nearly finished.” She wasn’t sure what she was talking about exactly. Was it that Tom was nearly to Nurmengard? Or that their struggle was nearly at an end? But there was no rosy future she could see. Even if they did escape Grindelwald’s designs, they would never be safe in this foreign time. Was it even possible to return to the future, to exist as they were in a world where events had unfolded drastically different? Or would their return be simply impossible with all they had done? They were thoughts she’d compartmentalized away, unwilling to face them alongside their current struggles. But now the doubts cut deep, the blade of reality slashing harshly across her dreams.

“I don’t know how,” Draco repeated hollowly into the silence and Hermione had no answer this time.


	38. Thirty Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ya'll rock. We're getting so dang close, but there's still some time to explore emotion, truth and trust.
> 
> WARNINGS: Sexual content

~*~ Thirty Eight ~*~

“No!”

The thrash of a leg and the raw scream that ripped into the sultry night had Hermione awake in an instant. She rolled on her side to face the source of the disruption and grimaced at what she found. Draco was coated in a film of heavy sweat, the sheets twisted around his torso damp. His head was flung back at an impossible angle, his mouth open and gasping. The exposed dark veins of his cursed leg stood out angrily in the night, seeming to pulse in the dim light cast by the moon. His hands flexed in the sheets, clawing so fiercely she worried he might tear through them.

“Not her… please not her.”

His voice was a ravaged plea, utterly lost and so broken it made her chest ache. Hermione cupped his face, drawing her hand gently across his clenching jaw. She pressed a light kiss at the side of his trembling lips.

“Wake up, Draco. It’s only a dream.” Her voice cut through the night like a knife through butter, parting the thick air and filling the space between them. He stirred, turbulent eyes blinking open, long lashes fluttering and then holding steady as he focused on her.

“Fuck,” he muttered, bringing a hand to rest on her wrist.

Hermione let out the breath she hadn’t known she was holding. “That’s the third one in as many days.”

“If I’d known telling you would mean opening the bloody dam and letting it all in again, I would have…” He trailed off, abruptly rolling away from her and running his hands through his loose hair. He growled, low and desperate. “Fuck.”

She sighed. “This isn’t your fault.”

“It’s my bloody brain.”

“Still not your fault. Mine’s hardly a picnic either. I may have stopped losing time—that I know of—but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a complete mess in here. I spend most of my available energy trying to make sure my psychotic husband doesn’t find a way to break into my head. That’s definitely more my fault than you having nightmares about the horrible things that have happened to you is yours.” Hermione inched closer to him, crawling slowly across the bed. “We’re only human, Draco.”

“I should be able to sleep, Hermione. It’s a basic human function.” He snarled the words, but she didn’t slow her approach. He angled toward her as she settled beside him, close enough to touch him easily, but letting him decide to initiate contact when he wanted. “And it’s not horrible things that have happened to me. It’s horrible things I did to other people. There is a distinct difference.”

He scowled down at the ghost of the Dark Mark on his arm. It had faded considerably upon their transition to the past and Hermione had only recognized it for what it was after she’d spent a significant amount of time with him unclothed. Unlike the stark lines of his curse, it was nearly imperceptible now that its link to Voldemort was severed. She wondered if Tom had even realized what it was during his time with Draco. He must have known about the marks from her memories, but Draco was the consummate deceiver and likely hadn’t given Tom the opportunity to study it in any detail.

“That doesn’t define you.”

He turned his arm over, removing the mark from view. “No, but I am the product of my decisions.”

“And we’ve decided to try and be happy,” she argued, unsure of how to bring him out of the shadow of his nightmares.

Draco scrubbed a hand over his haunted eyes. “I do want that even if I don’t deserve it. You make me feel like living is possible again, like every moment of life doesn’t have to be pain, even if I can never truly escape it. But Riddle is coming, Hermione, and Grindelwald will never let us go, not after we showed our hand. Say we do kill Riddle, then what? We spend the rest of our lives trapped in this tower like some sort of fairy tale princesses?”

She twisted her hands in her lap, teeth digging into her bottom lip. “We could escape, leaving Grindelwald behind. Go to America or Australia or anywhere else.”

“And just live a lie? Pretend we’re Muggles and that none of this ever happened to us? I don’t think I could do that.” He took a shuddering breath that sent chills down Hermione’s spine. She glanced sharply over at him. “I stole your time turner back at Hogwarts.”

“What?” She’d known it had gone missing, but assumed Dumbledore had appropriated it from her.

Draco held her stare, stormy eyes raging with emotion. “As soon as I realized Riddle was interested in you, I took it. I didn’t want him to find it and use it against us or anyone else.” He swallowed, the pause charged and heavy. “I think we should use it to leave. After we kill Riddle.”

Hermione froze, hands still and breath held. After a long moment she managed to whisper, “And go where?”

“Back.”

He didn’t need to specify further. She knew exactly what he meant. He wanted to return to the time they’d left, to a world hopefully changed beyond recognition. But most importantly, to a place where they had never lived through horror, never taken lives or watched blood soak into the sodden earth. To a place where they might not remember anything of what passed between them now, where they would be entirely different people.

Her jaw worked silently, fury, then dread rolling through her like thunder. Her hands shook now and she hardly trusted her voice as she said, “You want to erase our lives.”

He was suddenly on his knees in front of her, his hands trailing across her cheeks, her neck, her shoulders, excruciatingly gentle and full of adoration. “I love you, Hermione Granger, but I want a life with you that doesn’t have me waking up every night to the memory of blood on my hands, that doesn’t have you looking over your shoulder for the ghost of Riddle until the day you die. I want a life with you that isn’t tainted by darkness, that is good and real.”

“But if you take that all away, there may be no life for us at all, Draco. You’re taking away all the things that made me fall in love with you, all the pain and guilt that make this real. We’ll be different people; we’ll want different things. In all likelihood you’ll be with Astoria and I’ll have ten redheaded Weasleys running around. I don’t…” She shook with the emotion that had flooded her, the dread that was pumping through her veins with every frantic beat of her heart. “I don’t want that, Draco. I would rather live broken with you than live that life whole. You mean more to me than anyone ever has. You’ve taught me to find hope in the darkest places. Please don’t give up on us now.”

He bowed his head, forehead resting against the skin of her thighs. “I don’t know if I’m strong enough. I’m so tired, Hermione. Just so tired…”

She carded her fingers through his silken hair, stroking, letting her nails scrape across his scalp. “You’re not alone anymore, Draco. You don’t have to do it all yourself. Please lean on me, let me help you. Let me love you.”

Draco shifted, pressing a hot kiss against her skin and then another. He kept worshiping her with his lips as he gradually rose, guiding her back against the mattress. His touch left her trembling, the dread chased away by the steadfast caresses, the boundless devotion behind every movement of his body against hers. Her breath caught in her throat, her heart stuttered, her skin alit with a soul deep craving.

He smiled against her as Hermione’s hands dug against his shoulders, whimpers escaping her lips in breathy pants. She merely whined louder, craving him beyond the mere touch of skin. He smothered a laugh against her hip as he peeled the camisole from her body, leaving only her knickers separating them. Pulling her forward he drew his tongue along the seam of the cotton, teeth nipping a moment later. She mewled, hips bucking and fingers spasming into his hard muscles. Taking pity on her, Draco hooked a finger through the elastic and removed the final barrier. Her legs fell open and he kissed his way back up, strong hands parting her further until his mouth was at her core, his lips suckling, his tongue stroking. Hermione clung to him, ankles crossing behind his neck, hands clamping down on his tensed biceps.

The waves of pleasure built quickly, his knowledge of her body consummate now. He coaxed her slowly to the pinnacle each time, taking care to leave every nerve ending craving release before tumbling her over the edge with abandon. He didn’t tease her, didn’t force pleasure from her, but rather let her ride the crest of the wave as long as possible, catapulting her into a rapture that unfettered her, mind, body and soul.

Mouth slick with her pleasure, he eventually eased back. Holding her gaze, he licked his lips, debauched indulgence clouding his stormy eyes. She shook, shivers running from head to toe, hips canting toward him. The look passed a moment later as he held out his hand, the warmth of love tempering the hard edge of desire.

“I want to try something.”

His voice was low and rough. She took his hand, let him pull her to stand on trembling legs. He led her out of the bedroom, past the sitting room and onto the balcony. The moon shone down on them, his platinum hair now bathed in light, giving it an ethereal glow. His features were sharper, the harsh shadows making him achingly handsome, the tone of his muscles emphasized and the curve of his lips irresistible.

“I’ve never made love under the moon, with no walls to cage us in. I want to do this because…”

Hermione blinked at him, sensing the words he couldn’t say. _I may not have another chance._ Her stomached dropped and she closed the distance between them, pulling his lips roughly to hers. He would have a thousand more chances if she had anything to do with it. Draco melted into her, his hands falling to her bare hips, tracing the sensitive skin. She moaned into his mouth and he greedily swallowed it before trailing fire down the column of her throat as he worshiped her salty skin.

Her legs were unsteady again when he swept them out from under her. He gripped her steadily, her weight nothing to his muscular frame, as he guided her to straddle his hips, legs wrapped around his slim hips.

Hermione forced a coherent thought out of her mouth. “Are you sure? This won’t hurt?”

Draco shook his head, luminous hair a wild halo. “Your weight is on my hips, not my thighs. But I do need you to hold tight, both hands and legs.”

She tightened her grip on his shoulders, testing. He nodded in approval and she smiled at him, their faces nearly level with their new position. He let go for a moment and she felt the alignment of him against her entrance. Holding his radiant gaze, stormy eyes made unearthly by the moon and unbridled emotion, she relaxed her muscles a fraction and sank onto him. Their foreheads fell together, her gasp fueling his sharp intake of breath. He moved a handful of steps and she felt the ornate parapets come into contact with her back. The stone rails were high, but despite their perilous position near the edge of the balcony, she felt no fear, only the throb of completion as he thrust deeper, filling her wholly.

They moved easily together after that, her limbs holding fast to his strong frame, his hands guiding her hips with impeccable precision. Hermione refused to surrender entirely to the heady pleasure that soaked her body, choosing instead to memorize every pane of his moonlit face, every eddy in his storm cloud eyes, every breathy moan that fell from his swollen lips. He was hers and they were one in this moment, united in more than mere pleasure, in something primal and holy that made her believe in tomorrow. When her walls spasmed around him and he came tumbling after her in ecstasy, she relished the sudden warmth within her, the knowledge that one day they could create life together.

His legs trembling now, Draco gently lowered her back to the ground, shifting to lean against the parapets with her. His eyes traced the orb of the moon, a tremble to his lips she didn’t understand.

She pressed a soft kiss to his jaw, pulling his focus back to her. “I’m here. I’ll always be here. I promise you I’m not going anywhere.”

He sighed, sated pleasure slipping from his frame, replaced by a wariness Hermione recognized all too well. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Hermione Granger.”

“Fine. To the best of my abilities, I will always be with you,” she amended, brow furrowing.

He was silent a long moment, gaze wandering to the luminous crags of the Alps reaching for the star speckled sky. Finally, he sighed again. “Do you think you can do it?”

It wasn’t clear what he meant. “Do what?”

“Kill him.”

So they were talking about Tom. It had been a handful of days since Grindelwald had upended their lives and both Hermione and Draco knew their time was running out. Tom would be arriving any day at the steps of Nurmengard, uninhibited by Hogwarts since it was summer holiday and he was inevitably free from Dumbledore’s surveillance. Her Occlumency had shut him out entirely since the night he’d broken through after their intimacy, but Tom lurked in her thoughts, only banished when she was talking with Draco or participating in activities that used his mouth for other, equally distracting purposes.

“I don’t know.” It was the honest to Merlin truth of the matter. She’d been under the impression that killing Tom by her own hand was an impossibility until very recently. Now, she wasn’t sure. She had memories of him that made her heart warm and her body shiver from the ghost of his touch, but she could see him for what he was—a monster with more capacity for evil than should be possible for one human. But he was still only a murderous boy and not yet fully a monster. He had violated her so completely, but it had been out of misguided love, an emotion his dark soul could not properly interpret. The fact didn’t excuse him, didn’t give him the right to take away her autonomy, but it made clear how different he was from Voldemort. He had seen what his future held and chosen her instead. She still did not quite know what to make of it.

And there was the link between them that lingered beyond the destruction of the Horcrux. He was still in her head and that scared her more than she was willing to admit. Because if he was still in her head, were these her emotions that yearned for him or was it some trick, another manipulation designed to drive her into his arms? She had no idea what to think, if her thoughts were still her own. She’d had Draco do a thorough examination of her mind and he’d found no trace of Tom, but she knew better now. Tom was clever, dangerously so. And yet it also broke her to understand what they would do, to know the line that they would cross if they took him from the world.

Draco didn’t begrudge her the uncertainty. “The fiendfyre will take care of the Horcrux, if we can isolate it to a room in the castle. That unfortunately requires Grindelwald’s help. But when the time comes, I will do it if you cannot.”

It wasn’t the sort of thing you said thank you to. Swallowing, tongue heavy and mouth full of ashy longing, she laid her head against his shoulder and stared out at the starry night and moon-washed cliffs.


	39. Thirty Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, I'm back to work full time now and have increased responsibilities on top of that. That means for these last eight chapters I'm going to have to change the posting schedule a tad. I'll still post on Saturdays, but multiple times during the work week just isn't realistic anymore. I'll do Tuesday evenings only in addition to Saturday. Thank you for your patience with this modification. Take care and hope you are healthy, safe and well.

~*~ Thirty Nine ~*~

Hermione stirred, twisting away from Draco’s overwhelming heat. He murmured softly, but did not wake. She let out a breath. It was the first night he’d slumbered peacefully, the tendrils of horror finally failing to chase him into sleep. She slid silently from the bed, the floor cool against her bare feet. Pulling his shirt from the bench at the foot of the bed, she tugged the plain white tee over her head as she crept from the bedroom.

The air was still warm with the barest hint of a chill upon the soft breeze, the coldest it got in these lazy summer months. She sucked a deep breath, relishing the refreshing swell of her lungs. The strawberry glaze of dawn washed over the dolomite peaks as she moved to lean against the balustrades. She loved the moment just before dawn, when it felt like anything was possible, as if the whole world was taking a breath, erasing the past and preparing to swallow the future.

They were running out of time. She knew that. No matter how much she wanted to forget, to deny that their day of reckoning was coming, she knew Tom was nearly upon them. She couldn’t sense him in her mind, but she could feel him deep within, in the unsteady drum of her heart against its cage. When she’d told Draco of the odd sense, the utter certainty of his arrival, he’d merely nodded, ever unflappable, ever understanding of her odd connection to the boy who had hurt them both so very deeply. It made her heart stutter, her chest constrict, her love for him overflow.

She would never deserve him, but Hermione knew better than to presume anything was what she deserved. No, such petty ideas had long since died, having no place in a landscape so rent by scars. She sighed heavily, settling her elbows against the heavy rail as she stared into the stillness beyond her chaotic mind.

There was a moment of perfect silence, the rosy glow racing across the peaks beyond and then a shriek that echoed through her soul. An owl alit beside her, its wings a symphony of darkness. The chill that crashed down her spine was catastrophic and immediate. She knew that bird as easily as she’d known Hedwig once upon a time.

The owl extended its leg and she took the proffered scroll. The bird cocked its head at her, let out another chilling screech and disappeared into the blinding light of dawn, the brilliant white of the sun now washing away the cotton candy haze.

Hermione swallowed. She should drop the parchment over the parapet. She should burn it. She should check it for every dark incantation known to the Wizarding World. Instead her trembling fingers pried it open, breaking the serpentine wax seal. She could feel the beat of her heart in her temples, the icy tendrils of dread caressing her skin, the ghost of his breath on her neck.

_My dearest wife,_

_I told myself I would not write, that your betrayal deserved no such reward. But I find myself disgustingly sentimental since our wedding night and no matter how much I have resisted, I find myself sitting on our bed—the bed we vowed so much to each other upon—and unable to force the quill from between my fingers. Perhaps I will not actually send this. That would likely be the best for both of us._

_With school out and my new residence at Riddle House—yes, that is mine now, I have far too much time to think, my dearest wife. I find myself full of anger and vengeance—nothing new, but also a desire to explain, which is indeed foreign to me. I answer to no one, my darling, and yet I am answering to you. What have I done to myself? What have you done? This is absurd._

_And yet there is a misconception I feel I must correct. You told me I never gave you a choice, that I took control of you. But I need you to understand I did not. I admit I plundered your knowledge of myself without hesitation or regret, but I did not create your feelings for me. Not your desire and not even your affection. I admit our relationship was not what one might call in good faith… I used what I’d gleaned from your memories to best persuade you, to lead you, but you made the decisions. I headed off your doubts to keep you safe when the situation was perilous, but mostly I merely gave you what you most desired. Is it any wonder you fell for me when I could give you so perfectly what you craved?_

_It was, indeed, a very Slytherin seduction, but it was that, a seduction. I never forced you into my arms, never made you do something you did not want with perhaps one exception. You mentioned Malfoy—Salazar help that bastard when I get my hands on him. And in that you are, perhaps, correct. I needed something very important from him that day and you were the only resource I had at my disposal. So for that, I suppose, I apologize._

_I don’t think I’ve ever written those words, let alone spoken them before. Further proof that I am losing my mind. Are you a poison or a cure, my dearest wife? I suppose only time will tell._

_I will be coming for you and in that I know I will be merciless. So many of my plans have fallen by the wayside now, lost to the pursuit of you. It would be troubling if you were not worth every sacrifice. What is power compared with the satisfaction that you are mine? And you are. I know you feel it deep inside, just as I do. You can run to the ends of the world with your false love, but I am within you, my dearest wife. You are never beyond my reach._

_With love,_

_Your husband_

The parchment crumpled between her fingers. She stared down at the wad, breath jammed down her throat, caught between fear and something far more dangerous. Her fingers abruptly spasmed open, the missive toppling over the edge of the balcony. She didn’t watch it fall.

Sweet Merlin, she’d thought she was ready. She’d thought she could kill him. She’d thought so many things. She’d forgotten just how deeply he’d cut into her, just how far she was from being truly free. Draco was everything to her, a revelation that changed her entire point of view, and yet one note and she was craving Tom, lost in a labyrinth of his creation, her own emotions untrustworthy, her mind suddenly his once more.

She forced a ragged breath out, then another. In and out. Just the rise and fall of her chest and the sundrenched morning breaking across the Alps. This was real. The air within her lungs, the hint of cloying summer blooms upon the lethargic breeze. He was not here.

But he would be. Another breath in and out. It was all lies. It had to be. What he’d done had been too cruel, too calculated. This was nothing different. There was no way he’d given up his plans for her, no way he was truly apologizing for the night he’d used her and Draco in equal measure. He was deranged, lost in his pursuit of power. She was an object—a valuable one, but an object nonetheless. He was incapable of the depth of emotion required for genuine remorse.

Yes, this was yet another deception, another pretty lie to lure her back into complacency, to make her chase those rogue emotions that still believed he was worth fighting for. He was worth nothing to her and she would not be so foolish as to allow herself to think otherwise.

“It looks better on you.”

Hermione turned. Draco stood shirtless, leaning casually against the balcony doorframe, a gentle smile on his inviting lips that had her wanting to bite her tongue, to let the moment stretch into eternity. But this was no fairy tale and she could see nothing but pain in the glare of the rising sun.

“I got a letter from Tom.”

Draco was at her side in a heartbeat, his eyes a rising tempest. “Where? Was it—”

“Gone,” she interjected. “It’s gone. And no, it wasn’t cursed, at least not the parchment itself.” As for the contents, that was another matter entirely.

His eyes narrowed, lips twisting away all traces of the smile she’d wanted to save. “What did the bastard have to say?”

“That he never forced me, that he was sorry for what he did to us.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe it, Draco. I just can’t. He isn’t capable of remorse, of regret. All he’s ever done—for his entire life—is take.”

Draco was silent, his jaw clenched and his eyes raging. When he finally spoke, it was barely above a whisper. “We may need to consider that whatever exists between you has changed him as well as you.”

“What?”

“He may not be the same as he was. Whatever binding he placed between you is powerful. It wouldn’t surprise me that it has altered him, just as it has altered you.” The words were clearly painful to admit, but he did so without hesitation. “You have already inexorably altered his path. This may be another part of that.”

Hermione’s stomach churned. “Am I truly so different?”

“No, not fundamentally, but your feelings for him are ingrained now. I believe they may be impossible for you to eradicate no matter how much you desire them to be gone.” He swallowed thickly, his fingers tracing the curve of her jaw. “That is one of the many reasons I do not hold your continued attachment to him—despite everything between us—against you. You don’t seem to have a choice and perhaps neither does he.”

“He wouldn’t be so foolish as to tie himself to me, Draco. He wants to possess me, not for me to possess him,” she argued.

He moved a step closer, his breath mingling with hers. “Do not be so foolish as to underestimate what love can drive a man to do.”

Those were not empty words coming from him. He had blackened his soul for love, broken every part of himself to save Astoria. But Tom could not possibly love her in the all-consuming way Draco loved; he was self-serving to a fault, unable to put another before himself no matter how strongly attached he might have become. No, they were not comparable at all.

“He’s a misguided, dangerous boy playing with emotions he’ll never truly be capable of. Yes, whatever he did to me has made him stick, some facet of him seared into me, but I can see the truth of him too. I know how dangerous he is and I will not underestimate him.” Like Draco had mentioned countless times with respect to Voldemort, she had learned her lesson when it came to Tom Riddle. He would not catch her unaware again.

“Then you are prepared to do what is necessary. Regardless of what he says to you? Even if he repents, begs for your forgiveness?”

“He won’t.”

“But if he does.”

They were still a hair’s breadth from each other and she could feel him holding his breath, could see the silver clouds roiling in his eyes. Hermione swallowed, the metallic tang back in her throat.

“Yes.”

Draco’s gaze swept over every facet of her expression. “You don’t have to be sure.”

She’d thought before that he was right, that she could carry indecision into her final confrontation with the boy who’d wronged her at every level, with the boy who was her husband. But she’d read those honeyed words, heard his deep baritone whispering those false promises in her ear and she knew no such luxury existed. There would be no room for doubt when she faced Tom again. He would use every trick, every seduction, every tool in his arsenal of deception and she could not risk even a moment of vulnerability. She might not be able to change the pulse of him that echoed deep within, a discordant note against the steady beat of her heart, but she could stand strong. She could do what was necessary, the price be damned.

“Yes, I do. I know how much damage he can do… to me, to the whole world.” She worried her bottom lip a long moment. “Of course I wish I could save him, Draco. He means far too much to me, far more than he has any right to, but I also know I can’t. He’s crossed so many lines. And if he’s not hurting me, he’ll have turned on someone else. He can’t help it.”

“So we kill him.” It was a statement and a question, a declaration of darkness. It sent chills down her spine.

Hermione met his tumultuous stare, unblinking and steadfast. “Yes.”


	40. Forty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all, so we're finally here... where all the excitement begins. I have taken some liberties with Grindelwald's magical abilities, but I think that's fair because he has several decades worth of experience beyond Tom, Draco or Hermione. So forgive me for taking an... imaginative approach. Also Tom is finally back! I love writing him so much and this confrontation was one of my favorites to do. Remember, all my characters are shades of grey, especially Tom. Okay, I hope you enjoy!
> 
> WARNINGS: Canon violence.

~*~ Forty ~*~

The toll of the bells shattered the early dawn calm, Nurmengard going from sleepy fairy tale castle to battle fortress in the blink of an eye. Hermione was already pulling on a dark charcoal pair of trousers and a midnight black jumper when Grindelwald burst through their door.

Draco looked up from the couch where he was tying his boots, fully clothed. “Time?”

Grindelwald nodded—whatever differences still hung between them set aside for the moment. “He’s at the gates. My men have instructions to bring him to my study. I figured a private, contained setting would be more conducive to our business.”

“Appreciated,” Draco acknowledged, rising to his feet, robes flowing around him like a dark waterfall.

Hermione hadn’t seen him dressed for combat in weeks and she was reminded in an instant of how deadly he could be. Swallowing heavily, thinking of anything but the reality of what awaited them below, she pulled her own combat robes around her shoulders, relishing the familiar weight. Her wand was tucked neatly up her sleeve in the holster she’d used for the duration of their command with Grindelwald. She focused on the comforting slide of the wood against her forearm, on the ease with which her wand could drop into her hand, on the breadth of her knowledge.

Draco’s hand dropped heavily on her shoulder, spinning her into him. He captured her startled gasp with his lips, devouring her with an abandon that made her tremble beneath his strong grip. Having no care for Grindelwald, he continued to brand her lips, to kiss his way into the depths of her soul until she’d forgotten entirely what else she was to do but melt into him, returning every fevered caress with equal fervor.

When he pulled back, his chest was heaving, a breathless pant escaping his bruised lips. “Whatever happens, know that I love you.”

It took her a long moment to pull her senses together to reply coherently. “I could never forget that, Draco Malfoy. I love you too bloody much.”

“Good.” He pressed their lips together a final time, hard and fast and full of a desperation that tore into her.

“If the dramatics are out of the way,” Grindelwald groused, eyes narrowed in thinly veiled annoyance, “I do believe you have a guest waiting below.”

Draco’s gaze cut to the older wizard, a mask of steel descending over his angular features. “He will not be easily subdued.”

“I imagine that’s my part in this endeavor,” the man replied evenly, the Elder wand spinning between thin fingers before disappearing into the depths of his robes again. “I will have no problem disarming and detaining the young Mr. Riddle, Mr. Malfoy.”

“I certainly hope not,” Draco replied mildly before turning back to Hermione and holding out his hand. “Shall we?”

She took it, their fingers twining naturally together. Taking a deep breath that strained her lungs, she murmured, “Let’s do this.”

The trek down to Grindelwald’s study was a somber affair, none of them speaking and only the shuffle of footfalls breaking the brittle silence. She was about to see Tom again. It didn’t seem real. For all the times he’d broken into her head and even the shock of his letter, she’d never truly thought about what it would be like to stand across from her husband, to breathe the same air again.

And no matter what she felt for Draco, no matter that those emotions far eclipsed what she seemed unable to erase when it came to Tom, he was still her husband and despite everything that mattered to her. It was only a document in a courthouse in Little Hangleton, but it was real. She hadn’t worn her wedding band beyond the morning Draco rescued her, but she hadn’t destroyed it either. Even now, it lay in the pocket of her robes, a reminder of what might have been, if only he had known how to love another. Her grip tightened on Draco’s hand as she packed the myriad of emotions away, forcing them beneath the surface until only a cool detachment showed on her face. She would not fail in this. There would be time to be human another day, to pay the toll of her trespasses in full at a later date.

They stopped at a large wooden door. Grindelwald glanced over his shoulder, eyes brimming with an unnerving excitement. “I’ll go first.”

He swept into the room without further ado, leaving the door cracked, obscuring Draco and Hermione, but not shutting them out. “Mr. Riddle. I have been expecting you.”

“Where is my wife, Grindelwald?” Tom’s voice was everything she remembered, deep and sultry, soaked through with authority and confidence.

“Perhaps she doesn’t want to see you.” Grindelwald was a cat playing with a mouse, his words undercut with a dark glee that sent shivers down Hermione’s spine. “Perhaps she has found another, more worthy man. You are, after all, still a boy, Tom.”

Tom’s growl was low and primal and went straight to her gut. “She is mine.”

“I fear you are mistaken in that regard, Mr. Riddle.” Grindelwald didn’t bother to disguise the amusement that coated his words. “So if you are merely here because you want your wife back, I would suggest you leave before things get… ugly.”

“She is mine,” Tom repeated, a snarl now. “You will not take her from me.”

Draco tore away from Hermione, stepping through the door with a casualness that belied his earlier tension. “You have done that yourself, Riddle.”

“Malfoy.” It was a dark hiss, almost inhuman. “I’ll kill you for what you’ve done.”

“What have I done, Riddle?” Draco’s tone was still light, unconcerned.

“I warned you, I told you what would happen if you touched her.”

Hermione couldn’t see into the room from her perch beside the door, but she could imagine the rage in Tom’s eyes, sapphire darkened to deadly cobalt. But she knew Draco now, understood that he’d allowed the torture in Tom’s bedchamber, but was equally capable of evading it.

“Don’t try it, Riddle. You’re outnumbered here.” She could almost see determined set of Draco’s jaw, the flash of his stormy eyes. “I am far more capable than I led you to believe during our time at Hogwarts. How is your band of misfits, anyway? Still as incompetent as ever?”

“You’ll never frighten me, Malfoy,” Tom jeered, ignoring the dig. “But I imagine you’ll be very happy with Aurelia’s fate.”

Hermione’s blood ran cold. Draco’s voice was brittle ice when he snapped, “What?”

There was a dark chuckle that reminded Hermione of all the worst parts of Tom. “You thought I wouldn’t notice how she helped you take my wife away from me? That I wouldn’t find a way to crack the surface of your impenetrable shields? You may be the best Occlumens I’ve ever met, Malfoy, but even you have a breaking point. I only got there once, but that was all I needed. I never would have allowed you to kiss my fiancé if I hadn’t known exactly what it would do to your head. A larger mistake than I originally realized, but the payoff was sweet. My condolences for your wife. Such a pity. It really is too bad Astoria will never know her great aunt.”

A cold dagger of comprehension sank into her. The day in Tom’s room, when he’d made Draco watch. It hadn’t been about her or Draco’s jealousy or even Tom’s need for power. No, it had been about breaking Draco’s control, giving Tom the moment he needed to slip beneath those iron-clad defenses.

Nausea mixed with indignation, churning her gut and forcing her forward. She flung herself into the room, eyes bright with unleashed pain. “What the bloody hell did you do to her, Tom?”

“So you are here.” His expression softened a hair as his eyes devoured every facet of her. “Don’t worry, my dearest wife, I didn’t do anything so dramatic as kill her. She’ll have a very comfortable existence in St. Mungo’s for the duration of her abbreviated life.”

“You utter monster.” Draco crossed the room in an instant, fists tangling in Tom’s robes. He dragged the other boy across the room and flung him against the desk. Tom hissed at the impact, but stared balefully up at Draco from his haphazard landing position amongst Grindelwald’s scattered parchments.

“Is this supposed to scare me, Malfoy?”

Draco’s fist connected with Tom’s mouth with a solid crack. The darker boy’s head snapped back, blood welling from a split in his bottom lip. Eyes cobalt embers of rage, Tom ran his tongue deliberately over the injury. Draco still loomed over him, fist trembling and shoulders poised for action.

“You do remember we are wizards, Malfoy. There’s no need to settle this with such pathetic Muggle methods.” Tom spat a mouthful of blood to the stone below.

“This is the end for you,” Draco hissed, every inch the vicious Death Eater.

Tom laughed, chilling and bloodstained. “I doubt that.”

Spells filled the air within moments, walls cracking, furniture splintering with the onslaught. Hermione hung back, ready to jump in if the need arose, but still uneasy at turning her wand so deliberately on Tom, despite the hiss of fury in her veins. Despite the raw ache in her chest for the misery Aurelia now endured. Perhaps the curse Tom had wrought was reversible, but based on all she could not deny, she doubted he had such mercy within him. Merlin, she wished he was different, that the dark, charming boy who’d seduced her was all that lay beneath the surface.

There was a jet of green that had her ducking instinctively despite its target being across the room. She watched Grindelwald easily evade the curse and then begin a tirade of dark enchantments she’d never heard before. Tom managed well enough, blocking or evading most of the streams of deadly light, but when Draco joined in the assault a moment later, he faltered a step, retreating behind the massacred desk. But it would take more than one well-coordinated attack for Tom to go down and Hermione realized just how impossible the odds would have been without Grindelwald at their side. Her heart was only half in the fight and while Draco was beyond competent at the art of war, he seemed evenly matched with Tom. Indeed, what Tom lacked in battlefield experience, he made up for in raw power and a willingness to tap into the darkness raging within.

The desk shattered completely, pieces of wood spearing outward. Hermione dodged a particularly nasty projectile as she rolled, eyes never leaving Tom’s hunched form behind the desk. In the space between two spells, the ebony haired boy sprang into action, wand waving madly. Hermione’s feet slid out from under her and a moment later familiar hands were around her waist, the point of a wand jutting into the soft flesh of her throat.

Tom’s bulk against her evoked an echo of the heat she’d once known, his breath ragged against her ear as he spoke. “It’s over, Malfoy, Grindelwald. I leave now with her.”

“You wouldn’t hurt her.” Draco didn’t look like he entirely believed the words.

“I wouldn’t kill her,” Tom admitted, tracing a line with his wand from the frantic flutter of her pulse at her neck to the curve of her collarbone disappearing into her dark jumper. “But I’m more than willing to hurt her to save her from you. Can you say the same, Malfoy?”

“This isn’t love, Riddle.” She could almost hear Draco’s teeth grind, almost see the frantic scatter of his thoughts behind tempestuous eyes.

Tom pulled her more fully against him. His deep voice echoed through her soul as he spat, “She is mine.”

She belonged to nobody, but now wasn’t the time to incite further rage in the boy holding her like the world would end if his grip loosened even the slightest bit. Draco took a step closer, wand trained steadily on the pair of them. “Let her go.”

“Never.” Tom’s breath was frantic at her ear, his hands trembling where they clasped her, in desperation or rage she could not tell. “Come away with me, my dearest wife. Leave all of this behind. Leave him behind. He’s nothing compared to what I can give you.”

They were pretty words which might have held more weight if his deadly wand didn’t rest above her panicked heart. Tom’s lips skimmed across her skin, kissing a line of heat down her neck, but his wand didn’t waver and Hermione suspected his focus never left the other occupants of the room.

She caught the twitch of Draco’s eye, the subtle narrowing of his already thinly pressed lips. He blinked, suddenly staring directly at her. There was a desperation in his eyes that made her realize this would not end without bloodshed, that he was willing to do what was necessary to extract them from this complication. She dropped her head forward, a surrender to Tom’s ministrations, an affirmation to Draco’s request.

The _diffindo_ hit a moment later, arcing across her chest and carving into Tom’s wand arm. She gasped and dropped like a rock, blood staining her severed jumper. Tom’s inhale was a curdled gag and she felt him stagger away from her.

“ _Expelliarmus_.” Grindelwald’s calm voice cut into the chaos and Tom’s wand was soaring across the room. Grindelwald caught it easily and then weaved the Elder wand through a complex design. A glowing net flew out and over Tom as he ceased the chanting intonation, coating the dark boy in a faint iridescent lattice.

Gasping as blood continued to pour over her hands—now weakly trying to staunch the flow—she watched Tom lurch to his feet and attempt a wandless spell. It yielded no result and he turned an incendiary look on Grindelwald. “What have you done, you old bastard?”

“A little trick I have spent many decades perfecting. You are free to move about, but you will not be able to cast a single spell. Not even a _lumos_.” Tom’s handsome face twisted at the words, morphing from anger to horror to some ugly combination of the two. His dominant arm hovered uselessly in the air beside him, dripping a steady stream of blood onto the stone below.

Draco was at her side now, his wand anxiously tracing the deep slashes marring her chest. The blood-stained flesh began to slowly knit as he buried his hands in her hair, lips worshiping every inch of exposed skin in frantic desperation. Between the caresses, he murmured, “I’m sorry,” endlessly.

Hermione gripped his wand arm firmly, pulling herself into an upright position. “It was necessary, Draco. This is not another one of your sins.”

Swallowing heavily, he held her gaze for a long moment. Satisfied by whatever he saw there, he slowly straightened, lightning within his stormy eyes as he glared at Grindelwald. “You couldn’t have just done that to begin with?”

“Ah, but I wanted to measure the mettle of the boy, Mr. Malfoy. I learn nothing when I win in mere seconds, but a great deal when I allow my opponent the opportunity to believe they have a chance of succeeding.”

There was a warning in his words that was meant as much for Hermione and Draco as Tom. Whatever they were planning, he would be ten steps ahead of them. Hermione cast the unease away; there were currently larger problems facing her than Grindelwald’s clever machinations. With Tom rendered harmless, she had no idea how to proceed. The idea of killing him in cold blood instead of the heat of battle sat like lead in her stomach. And there was still the matter of the Horcrux firmly ensconced about his ring finger.

Draco clasped her forearm, drawing her slowly to stand. She wobbled a moment, hand reaching out for his shoulder, the effects of the blood loss hitting swiftly upon the change of position. They stood together a moment longer, her harsh breaths the only thing between them. When her limbs felt more solid, her heart less harried, she angled to face Grindelwald.

“What now?”

The elder wizard shrugged carelessly. “I’ve fulfilled my end of the bargain. What you do with Mr. Riddle is entirely up to the two of you. Indeed, I have learned enough to… ensure my own fate.”

“We’re not quite done,” Draco countered, shifting to stand beside Hermione, his arm wrapped securely about her waist. “There is still need of you.”

Grindelwald’s sky-blue eyes narrowed, but he seemed to accept the request. “If you insist, Mr. Malfoy.”

“I want to speak with my wife.” Tom’s voice cut across the room, softer than she’d expected, almost resigned. His eyes were luminous sapphires as he stared directly at her. “Privately.”

She expected Draco to refuse, to give him no quarter, but instead his stormy eyes hardened to icy daggers as he said, “Fine. I’ll give you a few minutes with Hermione if you give me your rings.”

Hermione started, gaze flickering to the Gaunt family ring—the disguised resurrection stone—that now adorned his right hand. Had he made another Horcrux or was he merely claiming his Slytherin legacy? Did he understand the other, more arcane power that ring possessed? Tom made no effort to pretend he didn’t know what Draco was asking. The grind of his teeth was audible across the wrecked study. His violent stare flickered to Draco as he pried the rings from his bloody fingers. “Doesn’t bloody matter anyway, Malfoy. Not without her.”

To say Hermione was shocked as the rings clattered onto the stone floor, blood splattering in their wake, was a momentous understatement. Voldemort had gone to incredible lengths to protect his Horcruxes and Tom had just surrendered his for mere minutes alone with her. He was vicious and cruel, obsessed with power and the Dark Arts; he was not a boy who threw away his plan for a girl. And yet. Hermione’s mouth was dry, a bitter taste creeping down her throat as Draco bent to pick up the discarded jewelry.

“You’re sure he’s secure?” Ice storms directed their full fury at Grindelwald, but the other wizard merely nodded.

“He can harm her physically if he wants, but there will be no magic available to him unless I will it so.” Those keen eyes dragged sharply across her face to land on Tom. “And I don’t believe he’ll hurt her.”

Unease blanketing his expression, Draco looked to Hermione. “You don’t have to do this.”

“You promised,” Tom hissed, crossing the room in a single stride. The blond cocked a brow at him, daring him to come closer. Tom stopped just short of Hermione, incensed stare boring through the other man.

“I promised. She didn’t.”

“It’s okay,” Hermione breathed, barely audible.

Draco squeezed her hand, fingers trailing softly across her skin as he pulled grudgingly away. “We’ll be on the other side of the door. If you call, I’ll be back in an instant.” His gaze skittered to the metal in his hand. “I believe I have the perfect remedy for these.”

She could feel Tom bristle beside her, could feel the weight of his hungry stare that followed Draco and his bounty out the door. It was only after the soft click of the lock reverberated through the demolished room that he dragged his burning eyes back to her.


	41. Forty One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am grateful to each and every one of you who reads this. You have made a positive difference in my life during these trying times. What follows may be nothing as you expected, or perhaps exactly as you expected. Without further ado...

~*~ Forty One~*~

“You’ve gotten better at Occlumency.”

“You hardly left me any other choice.”

Ebony waves fell across molten eyes as Tom nodded, not quite meeting her guarded stare. He calmly tore a strip of his robe away from the hem and deliberately wrapped it about the weeping wound Draco’s spell had engraved into his forearm. The steady bloom of red was swallowed by the dark cloth.

Tom returned his focus to her, undisguised hunger consuming his dark gaze. “I suppose not, but it was never my intention to hurt you, my dearest wife.” Hermione merely stared back at him, making little effort to conceal her blatant disbelief. Tom worried his bottom lip, rekindling the staunched blood flow. He licked his lips, smearing the crimson away before murmuring, “I trust you received my letter.”

“I won’t be manipulated by your lies, Tom.” She glared up at him, refusing to back away as he crowded into her space, as his breath ghosted across her cheek.

His lips skimmed her ear as he whispered, “I wrote nothing but the truth.”

Hermione’s teeth ground together in her effort to remain unaffected by him, by the temptation to believe yet another deception. She could feel him smile against her skin, could feel the paralyzing drag of his lips as he slowly shifted. She told herself to pull away, but the discordant string wrapped around her heart stilled the movement, delayed her retreat until it was too late and his lips were on hers. He tasted just as she remembered, dark and sultry with a hint of sweetness that had no place on a murderer’s lips.

She tore away, stumbling across the room, putting as much distance as possible between them, the room suddenly far too small. “Don’t.”

“Don’t kiss my wife?”

“I’m barely your wife.”

He laughed, mirth laced with acid. “We both know that isn’t true.”

“I am not yours, Tom. You know that as well as I do. You tore into my head. You treated me like a possession, not a person.” Her hands curled into trembling fists, the rage she held locked within threatening to burst free.

“I love you.” He looked torn between misery and disgust as he hurled the words between them.

“You don’t do what you did to someone you love, Tom.”

He dug his hands through his thick waves, expression shattering, becoming more vulnerable than she’d ever seen. “There’s something in me, Hermione, something wrong. It’s a need I can’t resist, an urge I have no ability to quell. I can’t describe it, but it’s always been there, ever since I was a small child. I must take what is mine.”

“There’s always a choice. If you truly love me, then you know there is another way. You can choose to be a good person, Tom.” She wasn’t sure she believed what she was saying, but a desperation she couldn’t fully justify was building within her. He might not deserve the words, the chance, but she was powerless to resist giving him the opportunity to prove he wasn’t lying, that his love for her was more than a broken, deluded need for control.

“No, I couldn’t. We both know that. My need to possess, my ability to inflict pain, my joy that comes at the moment a life leaves a body at my hands. I can see how I became the monster in your memories.” It was the first time he’d openly acknowledged Voldemort, that he knew what his future, her past, had held. “That you chose me at all, knowing what I could do, is impossible to understand.”

She barely resisted pointing out she hadn’t chosen him, but they’d already discussed that particular difference in opinion to death. Instead she glared at him, scathing and desperate, filled with a yearning she could not justify, backed by the sum of all the chaotic emotion he evoked. “But you did it anyway. You forced your father to kill your grandparents in front of me, Tom. You got your father’s blood all over my wedding dress.”

“If I could have spared you that horror, I would have.” A lost look crossed his enticing features, making him look far too human for her comfort. “I did not want you in the midst of all that bloodshed, but it was necessary to achieve a far greater aim.”

“Yes,” she agreed bitterly, “Your damn Horcruxes. You saw what happened to Voldemort and you still chose to split your soul. Three times.”

“No.” He looked sharply at her, ebony locks waving frantically about him as he shook his head. “Twice. Once for you and once to ensure survival. No more.”

“The ring…”

His penetrating stare flickered to the doorway, all too aware of what Draco was doing beyond. “Is just a ring. Well, not quite just a ring, but certainly not a Horcrux. I view it as a reminder of my ancestry, the power that is rightfully mine.”

“Oh,” her lips shaped the word slowly, the tightening vise in her chest stealing her breath away. “You didn’t…”

“I bound you to me because I cannot bear a life without you by my side. I used our marriage bed to cement another union between us, a ritual more ancient than all the texts of Hogwarts or even the Ministry’s libraries. I apologize for not being frank in that, but I was unsure of how you would respond… even so deeply under my…” Tom trailed off, suddenly unable to meet her stare, to admit just how profoundly he’d violated her. He cleared his throat, focus rooted on the stones between them. “Think what you will of me, but I am not a soulless monster. I bleed the same as you, I hurt the same as you and although I am… not as I ought to be, I am human despite it all. Every word I said on our wedding night and in that letter is the honest truth. Whoever I am, I am not Lord Voldemort.”

That name on his lips had her gasping, her breath caught in the cage of her chest, the atmosphere suddenly far too thick to force into her lungs. It was a long minute before she could focus again, before she could regain her senses enough to study the boy before her, to truly look at him. At the sharp cheekbones and full lips. At the dark brows above liquid sapphire eyes. At the ebony waves that framed such a handsome face. He was beautiful, undeniably dangerous, still the exquisite lord of darkness. But the soul that lurked beneath that enticing exterior was darker still, laden with a wickedness she could not fully comprehend. He’d admitted the pleasure he found in pain, in death and yet she still wanted to find a way to help the boy, the irrefutably human facet of him encased within the vile urges and insatiable lust for control.

“I wish I could save you.” She hadn’t meant to admit it, but Tom had a way of compelling things from her lips regardless of his presence in her head. She certainly didn’t want to mean it, but she could feel the truth of the words reverberate between them.

His head snapped up, a frantic swirl of emotion dancing through unfettered eyes. “Then come away with me. We can go somewhere else, far away from England, from all the temptations, from magic itself. I can be good if only I have you.”

“You would give up your legacy so easily? This power you claim is rightfully yours?”

“I would give up anything for you.”

The truth of his declaration echoed through her, certain and undeniable. He believed what he said—their connection rendering lies between them impossible. But would he mean it tomorrow, or the day after that? What about in six months, five years? Tom Riddle was capricious and cruel and she knew better than to believe those words would last. Not that she would go even if she didn’t doubt his ability to remain sincere. No, she was firmly Draco’s now and Tom had no place in her heart, not after his litany of trespasses.

“Then give me up.” If he wanted to prove the veracity of his statement, then this was her price.

“That is the one thing you know I cannot do.” He slowly closed the distance between them, luminous sapphire all but devouring her. “Ask me to give up magic. Ask me to renounce my legacy. Ask me to spare your precious Malfoy’s life. But do not ask me to give up what is emblazoned on my soul.”

That he would consider staying his hand against Draco and not exacting revenge on the man who had taken Hermione from him spoke to the magnitude of his attachment to her. She swallowed heavily, doubt beginning to fissure through her resolve. Perhaps this was no deception and that scared her more than anything.

“You feel it too, don’t you?” His full, enticing lips curved in a smile that contained no malice, no hint of the wickedness simmering beneath the surface of his psyche. “You can’t escape your feelings for me. I’m within you.”

Her hands tore into her tangled hair. “Godric, Tom. I can’t even hate you properly. You’ve taken even that from me. When Draco first pulled me out of it, before our wedding night, I wanted to murder you on the spot. I can still remember the rage that coiled within me, the righteous anger that I knew would guide me. But now? Now, I can’t even hate you. What did you do, Tom? Why can’t I get you out?”

He swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing. When his eyes met hers, they were pure sapphire, drenched in all the emotions she could not accept from him. “We are one now. Nothing so dark as the Horcrux, nothing life or death, but a partnership of the soul. I did not want to lose you and I knew there was a possibility the Horcrux could be destroyed. So I united us in another, more primitive way.”

An all too familiar horror skittered down her spine. “Get rid of it.”

“I can’t.”

“You won’t.”

He shook his head, something resembling genuine regret pulling at his dark features. “No, I can’t. It’s not reversible.”

It took her a moment to find breath again. “So I just have to live with this… part of you within me? I have to second guess every emotion I experience because it might be caused by this… abomination between us?”

Tom’s tongue ran over his bloody lip, the scarlet smearing across his full mouth. “It’s not an abomination. It’s a connection. I wouldn’t have been able to perform the ritual if you hadn’t felt something… significant for me of your own volition. I couldn’t coerce this into being and I feel it just as strongly as you do. It’s not like… what I did before.”

“When you raped my mind and then raped by body too,” Hermione hurled into the space between them, finding the strength to rekindle the rage simmering deep in her bones. That what remained between them was a product of her true feelings, of the foolish parts of her that had sincerely cared for him, was too nauseating to contemplate. She buried the disturbing truth beneath the rising anger.

Tom made a sound halfway between a sob and a feral snarl as his hands tore into ebony waves, the action threatening to rip the silken hair from his head. His eyes were limned with moisture, his deep voice threadbare as he rasped, “I only needed you to be mine. At first, I admit it was to control you, to ensure my own survival, but then I got to know you. I saw the powerful woman you’d become on the battlefield against… him. I saw the darkness and the suffering that made you lose time, that made your mind rebel against itself. I saw into your soul and I was captivated, Hermione. I only ever wanted you to be mine. I am powerless to resist you… please, Hermione…”

Perhaps even Tom did not know what he was begging for. Hermione certainly didn’t. She could hardly forgive him, could hardly stand to look at him when such fraught emotion saturated his every pore. She turned away, staring at the wreckage of the room beyond.

“If you want to make it better, then figure out how to get this… invasion out of me, Tom. Let me be free.” It wouldn’t make up for anything, wouldn’t change her view of him, but given the proper motivation perhaps he would put his razor-sharp intellect to use.

The silence hung between them, the only sound the scuff of his shoes and drag of his trousers against the stone as he shifted behind her. She could feel the moment he closed the distance between them, his breath making the hairs at the nape of her neck stand on end.

“I told you. I can’t.”

She shook, hands trembling at her sides. “So I have to live with this forever?”

“Or until I die.”

Despite her better judgment she whirled to face him. His gaze flickered toward the door and Hermione was reminded that in mere minutes he would be mortal again. It was not nearly as reassuring as it ought to have been. “Why, Tom? Why bind us together so permanently?”

“Because you are everything. I saw that other life, that world of power and eternal life, but I was gone, destroyed in the quest to attain such power. I didn’t want to lose myself so completely, so I bound us together, because if I have you, I know I can accomplish anything.”

Hermione’s stomach churned. He likely spoke the truth. Without Hermione his path was drenched in blood and darkness. But she could not save him, not with all that lay between them. “And what would you achieve now?”

“Now?” He shrugged, reckless and weary. “Now I want nothing beyond you.”

“I don’t believe you. I can’t,” she whispered, head shaking as she took a step back. “No matter how much a part of me—probably because of this thing you forced on me—wants to help you, to give you a chance at redemption. I will never forgive what you did to me, Tom. It doesn’t matter why, or if you love me. It matters what you took from me.”

“Then you know what you must do.”

She shoulders shook as an unyielding wave of agony descended upon her. “Please don’t make me do this, Tom.”

His lips turned up in a wan smile that felt like a serrated blade across her skin. “I’m not making you do anything, my dearest wife. Not this time.”

“I wish…” she fell silent, unwilling to voice just how much she wanted this conversation to end differently, to admit how much her next act would shatter what was left of her mended soul.

“Kiss me…” Tom caught his bottom lip between his teeth and the crimson blood welled again. His eyes were fractured beyond recognition when he whispered, “please.”

It was the last thing she wanted to do; it was the wish of a boy with death’s hand against his brow. Her lips were on his before she could decide it was the worst idea. The kiss was hard and desperate, more bitter than sweet, the culmination of all the tumult that lay between them. Tears dripped salt on their bloody lips as his hands—still encased in Grindelwald’s incantation—reverently traced the column of her neck.


	42. Forty Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all. I appreciate such wonderful readers so very much.
> 
> WARNINGS: Canon violence

~*~ Forty Two ~*~

As abruptly as they’d come together, Tom jerked away from her, his grip on her throat shifting from sensual to violent in the space of a heartbeat. The damp cloth of his makeshift bandage chafed against her neck, tendrils of his blood escaping to run down her quaking flesh. Hermione choked, air suddenly absent despite her best efforts to suck in a breath. He backed her gently against the wall, blood-shot eyes drowning in chaos, cruel fingers unrelenting.

“Salazar, how I wish I could do it. It would be so easy to just hold on, to watch you fade into nothing. They wouldn’t hear a thing and then it would only be a matter of getting the Elder Wand off of Grindelwald and retrieving my family ring. Yes, I know all about that. Your precious Malfoy wouldn’t know what hit him.” His fingers twitched and darkness started to eat away the corners of her vision.

“I hate you, Hermione Granger—Hermione Riddle. You’ve utterly destroyed me and I hate you for it. But I just can’t seem to forget the curve of your hip in my hand, the moan of my name on your lips, the crinkle of your eyes when you smile. I am tied to you just as surely as you are tied to me and I have no one to blame but myself for this foolishness. Love is the most dangerous weapon of them all, isn’t it, my dearest wife? Because of you, I will never become who I was meant to be. Instead, I’m just this pathetic wanker mooning after his adulterous wife. It’s revolting.”

Hermione trembled, her vision nearly black now. Tom pressed into her, his body fitting as perfectly as ever despite the absurdity of the situation. “Fuck,” he hissed sharply and his hand dropped from her neck.

She collapsed into him, coughing violently, smelling nothing but cloves and fear for a long moment. He caught her, held her pinned against the wall, but made no further move against her. She shuddered, throat raw and nerves decimated. But the paralysis of his touch was gone, the fear eaten away by the rage that still festered beneath her skin. Some part of her might still crave him, might still wish he could be saved, but it was hardly the majority. Her hand flew through the air, palm connecting solidly with his jaw. His head snapped sideways, red burgeoning across his sculpted cheek. 

Tom stumbled back a step, fingers tracing the imprint of her defiance. But his eyes did not darken to cobalt and his lips did not twist with cruel rage. His focus dropped to her neck, desperate sapphire trailing across the horror he’d perpetrated on her skin. His eyes squeezed shut, his expression distorting, his features becoming utterly foreign. She’d seen it on plenty of others, on the faces of nearly everyone she’d fought beside, on Draco more often than not, but never on him. It was guilt—the relentless kind that ripped into the soul with the knives of memory and would not be vanquished no matter how much time passed.

“Malfoy, get in here.” Tom’s voice was sharp, intense and mangled beyond his usual baritone.

Draco was there instantly, no sign of either Grindelwald or the rings. His eyes immediately found Hermione where she slumped against the wall gasping for breath, still feeling Tom’s punishing grip searing into her skin as she glared at the dark boy who had taken far too much, who made her feel the full gamut of emotion in the space of a mere heartbeat.

There was unholy violence buried within Draco’s tense expression as he turned back to Tom. “What the bloody hell did you do?”

Tom didn’t reply, but flung himself at the blond instead, hands tearing at his robes, fists connecting with his cheekbone and then his mouth. Draco reeled back, stunned for a moment, but lunged forward again, right fist swinging in a clean upper cut that knocked the darker boy’s head back with a wicked snap. Blood spewed from Tom’s lips, but a maniacal sneer remained upon them.

“Is that the best you’ve got?” Tom raised a hand, wiping the blood from his mouth, smearing it across his pale cheek.

Draco growled, low and dangerous. “I can wipe the floor with you, Riddle.”

“How intimidating, big scary Death Eater coming to kill me. I’m quivering in my boots.” The feral glint was back in Tom’s eyes, but they weren’t hard cobalt as she expected, but rather turbulent sapphire, more like Draco’s wild storms than their usual molten glass.

“Don’t bloody talk about things you don’t understand,” Draco hissed, slowly circling Tom.

The brunette let out a low scoff. “To claim I know nothing of Death Eaters is rather ironic, Malfoy.”

“You aren’t him.”

“True,” Tom admitted, rotating to face Draco as he moved. “But you still want to kill me because of him. Because of what he made you do.”

“He killed my wife,” Draco spat as he struck out with a lightning fast kick that had Tom stumbling back against the remains of the desk. “And my unborn child. He forced me to kill and torture. He made me pretend I liked it just like you, you sick fuck.”

Tom closed the distance between them in the space of an inhale, his fist connecting solidly with Draco’s jaw. The blonde jerked, collapsing backward, but Tom caught him, fingers digging into his biceps. “I never claimed to be a saint, Malfoy. I can’t help who I am any more than you can. And we both know you enjoyed it just as much as me. That power, that feeling of complete control over another life, it’s intoxicating.” He hauled Draco to him until their pants intermingled, blood smearing between them. “I’ve seen inside your head, Draco Malfoy, and I know just how black your soul is.”

Draco twisted out of reach, torment fracturing his elegant features. “You’re not even human, Riddle.”

“Then neither are you.” They glared at each other, the tension in the room ratcheting up with every passing second. Tom’s eyes were riotous sapphire, his face lined with a strain she could not interpret. Draco was equally unhinged, his jaw clenching silently.

“I should kill you for taking my wife away from me, Malfoy.”

“I should kill you for what you’ve done to her.”

Tom swallowed, gaze flickering to Hermione for a long moment. “That is the plan, isn’t it? To kill me.”

“You don’t deserve to live,” Draco ground out.

Tom brushed away a fresh trickle of blood from a cut on his cheek. His gaze was heavy, laden with judgment as it rested upon Draco. “And you do? I believe that if we were to compare crimes, Malfoy, you would be the one found more heinous, not I.”

“I never forced—”

“No, you only tortured, maimed and killed. By the scores. For nearly three bloody years. What is my father’s death, my grandparents’ deaths compared to your trail of carnage?” Tom chuckled, dark and yet not so cruel, no hint of pleasure in the sound. “You are in no position to judge me.”

“No,” Draco admitted. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t. Don’t pretend to be innocent here, Riddle. What you did to Hermione’s head is unforgivable in an entirely different way. Especially considering you claim to love her.”

The brunette surged forward, tackling Draco to the floor in bout of fury. “I do love her, you bloody bastard.”

Fists flew and limbs collided as the two grappled on the floor. Hermione was tempted to come between them, but knew she was just as likely to be hit as to pry them apart. She could use her wand, firmly ensconced her arm holster again, but this sort of brawl couldn’t be easily resolved with magic; it was more personal and primal than any duel.

Draco let out a loud grunt as he flipped Tom beneath him. He rolled the darker boy to his stomach, yanking one of Tom’s arms violently behind his back before bringing the knee of his good leg down firmly at the base of the brunette’s spine.

“This isn’t my first fight without a wand, you bastard.”

“Just do it, Malfoy. Get it bloody over with so you can go have a happily ever after with my wife.” Tom’s voice was muffled by the stone, but still clear, full of a pain she wouldn’t have believed him capable of even twenty-four hours before.

“What we’ve both done is unforgivable, Riddle,” Draco hissed. “What you did to Aurelia… that told me everything I needed to know about you. You may love Hermione, but the rest of the world is just collateral damage to you.”

Tom snarled, twisting futilely against the blond’s iron grip. “She took my wife away from me.”

Features a riot of torment, Draco sank his knee deeper into the other boy’s back. Tom’s breath rasped harshly against the stone as Draco spoke. “She did what I asked of her, nothing more. She saw a friend in need, in danger because of you and she helped. And because this was against your will, you killed her, or something very nearly like it. Despite the fact that Hermione cared for her, despite the fact that your choice hurt the woman you claim to love. So who did you punish, Riddle? Ultimately, Hermione.”

“And you. I was trying to hurt you,” Tom croaked. Draco made no move to release the pressure on his back.

“Aurelia may be Astoria’s great aunt, but nothing truly hurts me. Not anymore. Not the way you want.” The swirl of misery within those stormy eyes made her chest ache, made her wish everything had been different, made her realize just how infinite the depths of his suffering must extend.

Tom surged upward in a desperate heave, but only rolled to his back when Draco’s grip faltered, lips grimacing and free hand coming to clutch his cursed leg. Tom’s lip and cheek were bleeding again and his hair was flung in disarray about his darkly angelic face. His voice was hoarse, broken beyond recognition as he murmured, “We both know you only wish that were true.”

Draco’s fists clenched, his jaw grinding in the charged silence. Tom made no move, only tilting his head to stare up at his blond companion, blood trickling down his strong jaw to the pool on stone below.

“You’re a bloody menace, Riddle. You’ve hurt the only person you care for in the world other than yourself in ways that can never be mended. You’ve taken love and twisted it into something cruel and poisonous. You disgust me.”

“Then bloody execute me already. In case you haven’t noticed, I am entirely at your mercy.”

Hermione stumbled away from the wall, falling to her knees beside Draco, who was staring down at Tom, trepidation fracturing his fury as he registered the dark boy’s apparent surrender. She couldn’t force her eyes away from the macabre depths of Tom’s sapphire stare. Her wand slipped into her hand from the holster, a simple flick of her wrist that shattered every facet of her. She could feel Draco trembling beside her, the moment stealing away even his iron-clad nerves. The brunette didn’t blink, didn’t make a move to rise from his prone and helpless position against the bloody stones.

Tom’s liquid eyes fastened on her as he rasped, “I suppose we have the answer now. You are the poison, but so am I. Be free.”

Her heart skipped a handful of beats as the truth of his statement echoed in her bones, shaking her foundation. He would give her this; he would die for her. Whatever he had done, whatever irrevocable bond he had wrought between them, had distorted her, but it had decimated him. She lifted the veil of Occlumency between them and swayed, hand clutching at Draco’s shoulder, as the truth slammed into her.

The ancient ritual and its subsequent link had remade him entirely, contorted his darkness, transformed him from a sadistic schemer who worshiped at the altar of power and destruction, forever a slave to the siren song of suffering, to a boy capable of doubt, of genuine guilt. He had never felt the pain of others before, had never been affected by the destruction left in his wake, but now Tom understood the depths of suffering, the shadow of empathy coiling about his blackened soul. All because of her, his connection to her more potent than any other urge.

She could feel the truth of it, the depth of his overwhelming new emotions, the certainty of his commitment to die, to make things right in the only way he could. He was a monster, but in this moment, he was only a boy, drowning in remorse, beyond salvation, but not sacrifice.

Tears trickled down her cheeks, heavy and wet. She wanted—needed—him to fight back again, to snarl and dig his fingers into her flesh with possessive fury, to expose the monster, to be what he had been when he’d taken and taken until she bled dry. But instead he lay, compliant and darkly angelic, silently begging her to end their suffering.

Draco’s hand closed over hers, his fingers trembling. His voice was a miserable rasp in her ear. “Together. We do this together.”

There would be no coming back from this, she knew. No escape from what she had done to the boy who had loved her, broken and twisted though he might have been. He was still too dangerous to be kept alive. It sounded like a lie even as she thought it, even as she knew it was likely true. She wasn’t in the business of playing God and yet, wasn’t that why they were here? She’d traveled to his time with this despicable purpose in her heart. She just hadn’t expected her victim to be a boy she knew, a boy who she’d irrevocably changed, a boy for whom the vestiges of a not quite love still lingered in her soul despite his sins. She’d wanted a monster and gotten a wicked seducer instead, all hidden danger and alluring temptation. And now he was not even that; he was a broken nightmare, lost beyond measure, Hermione his only compass. His dark eyes blinked up at her as his bloody lips shaped her name.

_Bloody do it, Hermione._ Tom’s voice reverberated through her mind, a plea and a curse and everything in between.

She gagged, nearly collapsing to the rough stone below. Draco’s chest pressed into her black, his heartbeat frantic against her. His breath was hot against her ear, his hand shifting to hold her wand more firmly. “On the count of three. One, two, three.”

“ _Avada Kedavra_.”

Their voices melded into one and the brilliant green exploded from her wand. Tom began to form her name again, but his lips froze on the second syllable. She felt the cord between them draw taut, a bow stretched to its limit, and then it snapped, the connection abruptly ripped away, her soul left raw and wanting. Hermione surged forward, her hands tracing the unnaturally still column of his neck, her lips brushing his ashen cheek, smearing his blood. His eyes were dull now, sapphire extinguished to common blue and she closed the lids with trembling fingers. Even the shimmering light of Grindelwald’s foreign incantation was gone now.

Hermione collapsed beside him, unable to hold the heaving sobs and surging bile at bay. Distantly she felt Draco’s hand on her shoulder, against her back, but all she knew was the raw agony in her soul and the slow cool of Tom’s body against her.


	43. Forty Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your continued support. I already miss Tom nearly as much as Hermione does and I know I will be writing his character again. For those of you who don't quite feel as satisfied as you thought with Tom's demise, good. That means I've done my job right and made you care, even just the tiniest bit. No death should be taken lightly, not even Tom Riddle's. And now the aftermath...

~*~ Forty Three ~*~

Time had stopped the instant their spell hit Tom. The space between was laden with the impossible weight of her emotions, every molecule of her body, every filament of her soul undiluted agony. Hermione couldn’t feel her fingers, couldn’t move even if she’d tried. Sensation was gone, replaced by the searing ache of loss and the cloying nausea of guilt. The sound of sobbing was echoing, filling the claustrophobic space. A part of her knew the sound came from her own throat, that she was the source of such pitiable keens, but she couldn’t feel her vocal cords, couldn’t control of the flow of primal emotion off of her tongue.

A vise was closing around her chest, her heartbeat clanging uselessly against its grip. Every breath was harder to find than the last, every moment so much worse than the one before. Indeed, every inhale was one more away from when he’d been alive, when those lips had been warm and inviting, not frozen in the midst of her name for all eternity.

Her fingers dug more deeply into his immovable chest, the absence of breath undeniable. There had been death, loss, but never this. This was worse than feeling his soul ripped out of her, than feeling him become nothing in the space of a heartbeat. This was so final she could barely comprehend it. Had she understood what death meant before? She’d watched her friends fall one by one, but from a distance, through the fog of war where death was omnipresent. There was no battlefield in this cursed study despite the destruction they’d wreaked upon it. There was only murder—deliberate and planned, cruel beyond the necessity of war. This was life stolen away in the most heinous of ways, unforgivable and unforgettable despite Tom being a willing victim.

Tom’s robes were wet now, soaked in the sea of her penance. She could imagine drowning in this ocean, sinking to the darkest depths and letting the light fade away, letting the emptiness finally consume her. She yearned for such a release, an ending to this impossible suffering. The absolution of annihilation.

Strong hands shook her, rattling her limp frame, forcing time to start again. “Hermione, we have to go.”

She wrapped her hands more firmly in the cloth below. Her voice was foreign, entirely separate, as she croaked, “I won’t leave him.”

The hands on her shoulders became as unyielding as her grip. “We have no choice. Grindelwald helped me destroy the rings using fiendfyre. He knows his part in our agreement is complete. He’s going to come for us any second.”

So Tom was truly gone. She’d known it in the depths of her shattered soul the moment the cord between them snapped, but the confirmation dug deep, twisting the shards cruelly, reminding her in a nauseating wave of the finality of their choice. Their choice. Hers, but also Draco’s. They would never know who her wand had answered, which of them had mustered the conviction necessary to cast that killing blow. Hermione was sure it didn’t matter. She had chosen to say the words, had chosen to rip his soul away from him, to steal what wasn’t hers to take. Her lips found Tom’s closed lids and brushed across them, searching for the flutter of movement beneath, a denial of all she knew to be true.

Draco was pulling at her again. “We can’t stay. Every moment we spend here is closer to a lifetime of hell, of imprisonment at Grindelwald’s hands. You saw what he did to Tom; we don’t stand a chance.”

Something broke in her then, primal and deep. “We don’t deserve to! We don’t deserve to survive this. I don’t want to survive this.”

Draco finally succeeded in yanking her away from Tom, her trembling, numb body caving against him instead of the boy on the ground. “I know. Merlin, I know.”

“So let him come.” She would be content to wait for Grindelwald, to suffer whatever torment he deigned to mete out. She was too much of a coward to beg for death, but a life of servitude would suffice.

“No. I will not let us ravage ourselves to destroy one monster, only to turn around and serve another. I will never bow to the will of another again.” The grim certainty in his weary voice cut through the haze of guilt-ridden grief. Hermione looked at him, forcing her eyes to focus beyond the impression of light and dark. Stormy eyes came into focus, more agitated than she’d seen them, but also bright, unhindered by the emotion she found impossible to escape.

“Then death.” Her words were firm, acceptance flooding through her, quelling the storm within.

Draco blinked at her, horror skittering across his severe features. “Bloody hell, Hermione. No. I could never bloody kill you, not even if you begged me.”

The declaration hit too close to the dreadful scene that had played out only moments before. Hermione dry heaved into Draco’s robes, several of the gashes on his battered face still leaking onto the fabric, his blood now mingling with Tom’s on her quaking lips.

“But I want to die.”

The words hung between them, ghastly in their truth. Draco’s hands dug into her skin, sure to leave marks if her body lasted long enough for it to matter. His jaw twitched as he said evenly, “No. You don’t want to die. You want the suffering to be gone. There’s a difference.”

Hermione couldn’t help the glance over her shoulder at Tom. “I want it to never have happened. I want to never know what this feels like.”

The door banged and they both jumped, Draco’s hold on her more frantic than before. “I put the most intricate locking spell I knew on it when I came back in, but it’s Grindelwald. It isn’t going to hold for much longer. I need you to trust me.”

She could hardly trust herself, but the fight had been drained from her, eradicated by the act she could never erase. So she didn’t resist when Draco pulled her tightly to him, when a familiar chain settled around their shoulders and the world began to spin just as the door exploded from its hinges.

The explosion turned to dust, Grindelwald’s intimidating silhouette to shadow, and the hum of the battle fortress to complete stillness.

Draco removed the time turner from about their bodies, chain tinkling softly in the absolute silence. Hermione stumbled back a step, then another, back connecting with the same wall Tom had held her against. Dust billowed at the contact, coating her in a fine sheen and emphasizing that while this might be the same wall, it was definitely no longer 1944.

“What have you done?” Her voice was chock full of accusation, of muddled disbelief.

“The best option of a series of bad choices.” He was unrepentant, eyes a host of defiant storms.

“When are we?”

“Where we started, perhaps a bit later. It’s never wise to cross paths with yourself, so I errored on the side of caution.” He crossed the room, pushing the door open, clearly repaired sometime in the half century that had passed since its destruction. The air in the hall was no less stale, no sign of life, let alone occupation. Nurmengard was a ghost now, forgotten to the depths of time.

Hermione followed, not quite able to comprehend the leap they’d just made. She took a last glance at the floor of the former study, but it was nothing but dirt and forgotten time, no sign of the crime left, no bones or decayed flesh. It felt wrong, like the agony inside was a product of her imagination and not a gruesome facet of reality she would never escape. She had no idea how she kept her feet moving, how she walked silently after Draco until the cerulean sky ate the dust and the darkness away.

They were only halfway down the main stair of Nurmengard when the nausea hit. It knocked her over, sending her tumbling down a step or two, scraping her knees. She heaved, bile rising, but only air escaped her gaping mouth, throat already raw from the depths of her miserable grief. Distantly, she heard Draco topple too, then wretch violently.

Her head felt wrong again, off in ways that couldn’t be explained by the viscous mess of her emotions. Draco growled, platinum hair falling across feverish eyes as he crawled toward her, every movement etched in pain. Hermione hauled herself upright, barely able to maintain the position. His shoulder connected harshly with hers as he mirrored her position. His breath came in uneven pants, his pulse a wild flutter at his straining throat.

“I… think… we… we’ve… really… buggered… this… up,” she managed between straining breaths.

He coughed and blood fell on the stone. “We’re merging with the other time stream, the one without Riddle. It seemed the most likely outcome if we came back here.”

How he could string so many words together was beyond her. “What… does that… mean?”

“We’re about to be erased.”

That made her head snap to him despite the wave of nausea, despite the sharp spasm of pain. “What?”

His forehead dropped against hers, his skin clammy. “We talked about it.”

“I said… no.”

“You just said you wanted to forget all of this.” His eyes were bright, fighting to focus on her.

Hermione choked as she forced a riot of bile back down her throat. “I wanted… to forget… what we did… to Tom, not you.”

“You could never have lived like that. Even if you had me.” The sorrow in his expression cut deep, the truth of his words deeper. “It’s for the best.”

“It was… my choice.” It should have been. What they had done in that room had been her choice, no matter the consequences. At least she had known she’d written her own fate. But now Draco had robbed her of that, just as Tom had when he’d taken her mind. The intention was clearly different, but the sting still lashed into her. “You had… no right.”

“No,” he admitted. “But I would do it again. I would give you this freedom every time. There is more to life than suffering, Hermione, and you deserve to experience every moment of it.”

Another wave swept over her, the disorientation overpowering now. Her vision blurred and faded for a moment. Her stomach reeled from the constant upset. She clung to Draco, hand finding his shoulders, breath mingling with his uneven pants. “I only want… you.”

“I wish I could have been strong enough to give that to you,” he murmured, words drunken and uneven. His lips seared across hers, a poor imitation of a proper kiss. “I love you, Hermione Granger.”

She chased his lips, searching futilely for the sense of comfort, of coming home she always found against them. But there was nothing but chaos now, darkness eating away her memories, her senses until only the abyss loomed before her. She stared down at it and then let go, toppling endlessly through vast emptiness, drowning in an infinite night.


	44. Forty Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I continue to be impressed with all my readers. Thank you for reaching out or simply just enjoying. I appreciate all in equal measure. I want to credit April White and her Immortal Descendants series for some of my ideas about time travel and what happens when you create a time split. And super shout out to Gemma Barrett who narrated the first few audiobooks of that series. Her ability to create character voices is some of the best I've ever encountered in an audiobook.
> 
> Okay, we're nearing the end here. There are two more chapters after this one. A short one and a long one. I can't believe we're almost there, but right now, there's still plenty to come... ;)
> 
> WARNINGS: Sexual content

~*~ Forty Four ~*~

Hermione’s head throbbed like she’d had a few too many firewhiskeys at the Leaky Cauldron or woken up with Luna in some horrible hotel room with only a vague memory of dancing the night before. It happened more than she liked to admit, but had ceased to be a common occurrence when they’d both found employment in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry of Magic. The department heads tended to frown upon their employees ending up two sheets to the wind and possibly compromising the security of their work.

So it made very little sense that she was slumped across rough stone with a hangover sized headache and no memory of the day before, let alone the night. Groaning softly, she rolled to her back and was confronted with a decidedly male body splayed across her. Silken hair tickled her cheek and she pulled back to see angular features framed by rough cut platinum hair that fell just beneath his jaw. She blinked, his entire face coming into focus. Draco Malfoy? She’d ended up passed out on a staircase with Draco Malfoy?

It didn’t seem impossible, but was highly unlikely. She hadn’t seen him in several years, not since a Quidditch World Cup where they’d sat together to watch Harry play. Last she’d known, he’d taken over the Malfoy estate and was divesting the family of any nefarious assets that had been connected to his late, mad aunt.

Studying his defined features, letting her gaze linger on his full lips, she had to admit he was more than attractive enough to warrant a liaison. But they’d always been in slightly different circles, only his friendship with Harry tying them together, so the opportunity had never arisen. At least until now, it seemed.

She gently shook him, hoping that he could shed some light on their current predicament. His eyes fluttered open, long lashes framing otherworldly gray that had always reminded her of stormy seas or frosty winters. He swallowed heavily a few times as he pushed upright, the loss of contact between them leaving her far more bereft than she had any right to feel.

“Granger?” His voice was deeper than she remembered and rimed with an exhaustion she shared.

“Yeah.” She smiled sheepishly. “Any idea how we got here? I seem to be drawing a blank.”

Malfoy pushed to his feet, legs wobbling for a moment. He surveyed their surroundings, taking in the dilapidated castle at the top of the stair and the grand sweep of barren peaks beyond. “What the fuck? Last I remember I was playing a quidditch game with Harry and a few of the other blokes. The great super star finally found some time to slum it with us regular folk.”

Hermione rose slowly to join him, turning in a bewildered circle. “Luna and I were shopping for wedding dresses.”

“Congratulations.”

She blinked at him. “Oh. No. Not my wedding. Hers. I haven’t been able to wrangle anyone since Ron decided my interest in continuing to work was incompatible with his desire to have a family.”

“Weasley’s an idiot.”

“Thanks.” She glanced glumly around, willing her memories to return. But there was nothing, just a nebulous haze that made her vaguely uneasy. She glanced over at Malfoy. “Anything?”

“I think these are the Alps, but I have no bloody idea what we’re doing here.” He searched his pockets, brow furrowed until his wand appeared. “Well, we haven’t been disarmed, so I think we can rule out an attack of any type. Odd.”

“Very,” she agreed. “Want to explore the castle?”

He turned to the dark fortress behind them, its stones black with ruin. A tremor seemed to run through him before he turned abruptly away. “I think not. Something doesn’t feel quite right about it.”

Hermione couldn’t help but agree. Every time she looked at the forbidding structure, the hair on her arms rose and a chill she couldn’t explain ran down her spine. The curious part of her, the part that had landed her firmly in Ravenclaw wanted to figure out what caused the unfamiliar sensation, but she was hardly a foolhardy Gryffindor and felt no need to charge in unprepared. Sighing, she turned to face Malfoy. “So now what?”

“We find a tavern and have a drink or two. I, for one, am definitely not fit to apparate anywhere, especially when I don’t even know where I currently am.” He trudged down the stairs and began descending a winding path she had missed in her earlier examination of the forest beyond. “I figure we head into one of the vales and we ought to find some sign of civilization, Muggle or Magical.”

“And if we don’t?” She kept her eyes on the ground beneath them, stepping carefully over stones in the path.

“Then we deal with that when we have to and not a minute before. My head hurts too bloody much to think that far ahead.”

Thankfully the first glen they entered quickly gave way to a sleepy mountain town boasting cobbled streets and kitschy storefronts bursting with postcards featuring the dark castle they’d left behind. Hermione scanned the images, quickly digesting the information they revealed.

“Nurmengard? Isn’t that where Dumbledore and Grindelwald had their showdown, back during the war?”

Malfoy’s eyes slid to her and then the array of postcards. “Yeah. I think Grindelwald is still held in the upper level, incarcerated in his own prison until nature takes him.”

A shiver skittered over her skin. “Probably a good thing we didn’t go inside.”

He murmured an affirmation while running a hand through his disheveled hair. “I guess that tells us where we are.”

“But not why.”

“No.” He sounded more confused than ever and she couldn’t blame him. She’d only ever had a passing interest in Grindelwald, the most notorious Dark Wizard to ever live. He was more ghost story than reality, used to scare children into avoiding the Restricted Section, despite his continued existence in the depths of Nurmengard. She would never have undertaken a trip to the infamous castle on her own.

Malfoy had already moved on and she hurried to catch up with him as he rounded a corner where brilliant summer blooms spilled out of stone planters set atop the uneven cobbles. The whole town had embraced the summer heat, seating entirely moved outdoors, flowers hung from every eave. It would have been charming if Hermione hadn’t been preoccupied by their mere presence in such an unfamiliar place.

A tavern took up most of the sidewalk and part of the street midway down the next block and Malfoy stopped, dropping into a vacant seat. Hermione followed suit, scanning the menu sitting on the table, but coming up blank when she realized it was in German and French. Her counterpart seemed to have no such language barrier as he surveyed its contents.

A young woman with an outline of Nurmengard etched on her obscenely pink t-shirt stopped by the table and Malfoy ordered for them, speaking what she assumed was French. He cast a weary smile in her direction as the girl maneuvered back toward the building. “I hope you don’t mind a Weissbier.”

“At this point I’ll take anything.”

He nodded in sympathy. “Tell me about it. I ordered a pretzel for both of us too, so hopefully food in our stomachs will make the nausea go away. What the bloody hell were we doing yesterday, Granger? I haven’t felt this bad since Potter’s stag night.”

Hermione snorted. “You lot were a right mess, weren’t you?”

“Almost didn’t make the rehearsal,” he admitted, wry smile twisting his full lips.

She looked away, trying to ignore the pang of desire that shot through her. Since when did she think Draco Malfoy’s lips were so sensuous? Clearing her throat, she focused on anything else, which ended up being quidditch of all things. “I miss watching all of you play. Slytherin was undefeated for how many years running?”

“Five,” Malfoy proudly announced. “But it was all Potter. He’s the best seeker Britain has seen in at least half a century.”

She shook her head, giving him a knowing smile. “That’s not entirely true you know. You were a bloody good chaser, could have gone professional like Harry if you’d wanted.”

His eyes rolled, color rising on his alabaster skin. “Thanks for the compliment, Granger, but I’m no Oliver Wood. Bloody Gryffindor. We had to wait for him to graduate before we stood half a chance.”

The waitress set down their drinks, saying something that must have meant their food would be out later. Malfoy thanked her, the only bit of the exchange she truly understood, and sipped greedily at his beer. Hermione raised her glass and took a tentative sip, then a gulp. The light amber liquid was refreshing in the summer heat, the taste delicate for a beer and perfect for an afternoon on the patio.

“You still at the Department of Mysteries?”

She nodded, pushing a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “Yeah. Pretty much a dream job even if I can’t really talk about it. What about you?”

“Getting rid of Bella’s mess mostly. My father is a moron for looking the other way for so long, even if she was my mother’s sister. Mother always saw her for what she was, that’s why she and Aunt Andromeda started documenting Bella’s insanity back when they were all still under one roof. Just goes to show how far prejudice can drive you. My father is still under the mistaken belief that our last name means something beyond bad faith in French.” He shook his head ruefully, platinum strands falling enticingly over stormy eyes. “But as I said, he’s a moron.”

Hermione nodded, unsurprised by his derision toward the senior Malfoy. It had become quite apparent during their years at Hogwarts that while some families still clung to the ideals of blood purity, Malfoy and his mother were not among them. He’d once knocked out Vincent Crabbe’s teeth with his bare fist when the ingrate had called her a Mudblood. No one else in Slytherin or any of the other houses had dared to insult her again. Malfoy and Harry had been like royalty in the dungeons and crossing them was simply not done.

“Weren’t you and Astoria Greengrass engaged?” The alcohol was freeing her tongue perhaps a bit too much.

He paused, setting his drink back on the picnic-style table. “We were. We set a date and everything. Rented this beautiful villa on the coast of Greece.”

Malfoy fell silent, teeth worrying his bottom lip, light fading behind his eyes. Hermione swallowed, wanting to look away, but compelled to understand what had happened. “But?”

“There was an accident. She didn’t make it to St. Mungo’s in time.”

The breath rushed out of her lungs, a feeling of dread twisting her stomach. She felt sick, but there was something else beyond the pang of sorrow, an echo of another grief, a memory that she couldn’t quite touch. She concentrated on his face instead, on the line of his jaw that trembled just a hair, on the tempests breaking free in his eyes. “I’m so sorry, Draco. I hadn’t heard. Harry should have told me.”

“I made him promise not to.” He scraped a hand over his face. “It all happened so fast and I couldn’t deal, not for months. Harry helped as best he could, Blaise too, but I couldn’t stand the thought of the rest of you knowing. It would make it too… real, or something.”

She broached the distance between them, clasping her hand over his. “I would have been there too, if you’d let me. So would Pansy, Luna and Padma.”

He turned his hand over, their fingers lacing effortlessly together. “Thank you. It was silly of me to cut you all out. To keep the funeral a private affair. But it was years ago now, just after graduation from Hogwarts.”

It explained why he’d drifted away, why their lives had ceased to overlap in even the barest of ways. “I missed you.”

His features twisted in amusement, grief slowly chased away. “I was under the impression you didn’t even like me that much, Hermione Granger.”

“I thought you were an arrogant ass who was too handsome for his own good. That doesn’t mean I didn’t like you.” The words were out before she could think better and she could feel the flush that rose on her cheeks as his eyes widened.

Hermione barely noticed the girl delivering their pretzels. Malfoy’s eyes swept across her face, darting down the column of her neck to the fitted tank top she wore below before slowly trailing back up. The fire the overt leer ignited was overpowering, greater than any burn of desire she could remember. Had she always been so attuned to him? She didn’t think so. They never would have made it out of Hogwarts without falling into a cupboard together if she’d reacted this forcefully to him as a teenager.

Holding her stare, his thumb caressed the supple skin of her wrist. The resulting tremor shot straight to her core, embarrassing heat pooling between her legs. Pretzels and beers forgotten, he tossed a handful of euros on the table and pulled her to stand. Hermione’s heart beat out of her chest as she let him lead her across the square. They stopped briefly to chat with a young concierge at a quaint hotel before being handed a large brass room key.

Her skin was on fire where his hand gripped hers, desperation for his touch humming within. She had never felt this connected. The urgency to feel him against her, inside her, to taste his lips was inexplicable. She’d found him objectively attractive for years, but she’d never had to fight the urge to tear his clothes off. They were friends. Just friends. But friends didn’t crave the heat of each other’s mouths, nor tilt toward the edge of orgasmic bliss from a simple sultry look.

The hotel door banged shut and her back was against it, Malfoy’s body pressing along every inch of hers, like it had been there a thousand times before, like they fit perfectly. His inhale was unsteady, his heartbeat thunder against her chest. “Tell me to stop.”

She should break the connection, should take a step back and examine the tidal wave of unfamiliar desire that encompassed both of them. She closed the distance instead. His lips parted instantly, devouring her like a starving man, tongue plundering the depths of her mouth. She moaned, wanton and frantic, surrendering to him in every possible way.

They clawed at each other, clothes flying and breath panting, lips latching on to bare skin at every chance they got. He was leaning against her, muscles toned and well defined, her hands greedily tracing every contour. His teeth dragged across her breasts, skimming her nipples before dropping to nip at the juncture of her thighs. The last layers between them were ripped away as they stumbled toward the bed. He bent to bring his mouth back to her pulsing core, but she hauled him up, unwilling to wait another moment before feeling him sink inside of her.

Malfoy’s swollen lips parted, a strangled moan falling from them as he filled her. Her walls spasmed, a reminder that it had been at least a year since she’d done this. But the pain melted into pleasure within the first stroke and soon she was thrusting up, meeting him halfway, pleasure mewling from her parted lips. He swallowed her moans, mouth demanding and hot and undeniable. Her ankles locked around his strong thighs, the angle shifting to create a steady build of pleasure beneath her navel. His first name tore from her as she crashed over the edge, entire body twitching in unparalleled ecstasy.

He made her fall into that abyss several more times before he finally succumbed to his own need, shooting hot and deep within her. They remained twined together even as the raw edge of desire abated.

Hermione was shaking, from the aftermath of the relentless tide of orgasms, but also from the depth of emotion that had accompanied them. This hadn’t felt like their first time at all. It had seemed as though they’d done this so many times their bodies knew each other, the feelings connecting them far beyond the lust of a one-night stand. The way his stormy eyes had cleared as he’d come, his entire world narrowed to the woman beneath him—to her—made no sense at all. That was the look of a man deeply in love, not a former friend discovering new territory.

Malfoy’s breathing had turned even and Hermione realized he’d succumbed to the exhaustion that had been chasing them ever since their mysterious arrival on the Nurmengard steps. Giving up trying to puzzle out their situation, she surrendered as well, content to melt into the circle of his arms, to simply enjoy the total completion of him beside her.


	45. Forty Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here we are, on the brink of the end. Can you believe it? I almost can't. This one is a bit on the short side (apologies), but it packs a punch far above its weight class.
> 
> I appreciate all you wonderful readers and look forward to finishing this journey with you on Saturday.

~*~ Forty Five ~*~

_Raw agony, so sharp it cuts through her bones, vivisecting her, tearing apart her soul._

_A boy with eyes as blue as luminous sapphires and lips as dangerous as sin._

_Blood, everywhere, on her hands, in her hair, in the sodden mud._

_A loss of control so total she can barely breathe, her will warped by another._

_A wedding in a red satin gown that’s splattered in blood._

_A connection so deep it remakes her as the dark boy takes off her gown, feverish eyes watching her in a mirror._

_A man with midnight hair that fades to platinum._

_A curse dark and ugly against his pale skin._

_Stormy eyes that undo her soul and then mend it, pulling valiantly at her broken pieces._

_A jet of green light that breaks her heart._

_A vow of love, a promise of a second chance._

Hermione awoke gasping, the jumble of images still ricocheting through her mind. It had hurt so much; there had been so much suffering, so much loss, she could hardly imagine any one person bearing it. She rolled to the side, dislodging Draco, who shot upright beside her.

The sun had set, the light of the moon the only illumination in their cozy hotel room. Even still, she could see the depths of horror written across his features as he stared down at her, jaw working silently.

She swallowed around the growing lump in her throat. “Did you…?”

“Dream or see or whatever you want to call it?” His voice was different now, laden with an edge that was not his to bear. “Yes. I saw. I think… I think I was a murderer. A torturer. An instrument of evil.”

“I killed my husband because he was a monster.”

“I became a monster to save my wife, but she died anyway.”

“I fell in love with you.”

“I fell in love with you.”

Silence fell, the horror still hanging between them, a thick fog that would not clear. Hermione’s head dropped back against the pillow as she desperately tried to forget everything she’d seen. It hurt too much to remember; it couldn’t possibly be real.

“What was it, Draco?”

He dropped down beside her, his lips skimming her forehead. “I’m not sure.”

“I don’t want to remember it.” She knew that more surely than she’d known anything else. Even the wounded, broken woman in her dream hadn’t wanted to remember.

“I don’t think we have a choice,” he admitted softly. “It feels like… a ghost of a memory. Even if we were to try to use memory magic to erase the dreams, they wouldn’t stay away. Not if they’re actually a part of us.”

Hermione shuddered. “Why would they be a part of us?”

“Something happened to us today, Hermione. Something bigger than we can understand. I woke up in the middle of the Alps, head over heels in love with you. I may have liked you before—wanted you, certainly—but I wasn’t in love with you. Emotions don’t just change overnight. People don’t just lose time and wake up somewhere else.” He slipped out from under the covers and reached into his robe pocket. A shimmering silver cord emerged with a delicate hourglass dangling from it. “And I found this in my pocket.”

A time turner. Hermione emitted a low gasp, extending a hand to grasp the dainty—but powerful—instrument. Draco let it drop to her palm. The Ministry of Magic did not allow these to fall into just anyone’s hands. If they were in possession of one, it meant he was right. Much more had transpired than a mere blackout and relocation. Which meant he was also likely correct about their dreams. The horror still echoing through her might have been real. Had she lived those moments? Endured that agony? Made those terrible choices? It was utterly incomprehensible, but seemingly undeniable.

She blinked up at Draco, unmoored and searching. “What do we do now?”

“We live. If what we saw is even partially true, we both sacrificed everything to get to this moment. It would be a travesty if we didn’t move forward, if we didn’t move on.” He sank down on the mattress beside her, his fingers stroking gently across her cheek. “We can’t squander this. Not after everything.”

“How do we live with what we did? With all that suffering?” It seemed impossible to overcome. She knew she’d been willing to die by the end, that she’d found it preferable to the eternal struggle and suffocating guilt.

Draco caught her chin, forcing her to stare directly up at him. “We did not do any of it. We went to Hogwarts together. We were friends. There was no war and no monster. We never traveled to the past. Astoria did die in my life too, but that’s the only tragedy I have lived through. Those lives we remember? They aren’t ours. They’re an echo of what might have been. We cannot let them define us.”

“So should I stop loving you?”

“If that’s what you want.” His expression was soft, softer than such a declaration deserved. “I don’t think I want to stop loving you.”

“I don’t either,” she whispered, hand rising to intertwine with his. “So…”

“So,” he echoed, pressing a kiss to her wrist.

Hermione flushed, but didn’t chase the tide of desire as it rose. Draco settled on the bed beside her, their shoulders brushing as they stared into the dark night together. She didn’t understand what had happened, least of all the horrors her dream had foisted upon her, but she knew she didn’t want to be anywhere else, that despite everything she was home as long as he was with her. For now, it would be enough.


	46. Epilogue

~*~ Epilogue ~*~

“You don’t have to come.”

Hermione twisted to look over her shoulder at Draco. He paused, expression inscrutable as he brushed platinum bangs out of his face. “I won’t if you don’t want me to. I know this is…”

She swallowed, turning back to survey the array of marble headstones spread before them. Autumn had dusted the ground with fiery leaves that crackled under their feet and made the tombstones seem to float above a rich sea of flame. The jagged cut of the Alps jutted into the cloudy sky beyond, the foamy mass nearly the same tone as Draco’s eyes. The sight filled her with a foreign nostalgia, borne of the memories that often soaked through.

It had taken years. Years that saw joy fracture the nebulous sorrow those memories held. Years that saw her become a wife and then a mother. Years to wrestle with the volatile truths that were not her own to bear. Years to decide to search for and find this graveyard. Years to prepare for this moment.

“I want you with me.”

Her husband nodded, his fingers lacing easily with hers, the movement as natural as breathing. “Whatever you need from me.”

“Thank you,” she murmured as she took one step and then another. The leaves rustled as they walked, the only sound beyond the building drum of her heart against her chest.

She let her feet lead them—a sense she could not explain, an echo of a connection that had not been her own, guiding the way. The weathered stone lay beneath a yew tree, dirt and grime coating the marble so thickly it appeared an extension of the earth below. Hermione dropped to her knees, Draco’s hand slipping to rest firmly upon the curve of her shoulder. With a shaking hand she reached out, her bare fingers brushing across the caked soil, tentative at first and then with more certainty until the coating fell away and the etched marble beneath was revealed. Her breath was uneven, her pulse an erratic tattoo as she traced the letters.

_Tom Marvolo Riddle_

She had imagined this moment a thousand times by now. Had planned every word she would say and yet, now her throat was closed and her lungs buried under a pressure that did not come from the thin air above the mountainside. She closed her eyes, letting all that had come before wash over her.

In the months after the foreign memories had been forced upon them, she had retreated, taking a leave of absence from the Department of Mysteries, refusing to see anyone but Draco. Harry had sat on the floor outside her flat day after day, simply talking to her through the sealed door. She’d listened to every word, but had been unable to form a single syllable in response.

It was as if the trauma the other girl had endured was now her own, etched into her marrow with blood and tears. Hermione had felt every loss the girl had endured, every torment and every deception so keenly she ached, the mental anguish manifesting in physical pain. It had been too much to process, too much to compartmentalize away even if it had not been her own.

Draco hadn’t left her side. Had effectively moved in with her in that tiny one bedroom flat, dropping his work without a second thought. They’d cried more nights than not, the pain a visceral thing that ate away at them even in the oblivion of slumber.

It had felt like an abyss with no escape, an end to the life she’d barely lived. But Draco hadn’t allowed her to wallow forever. He’d opened the door to Harry and forced Hermione into her best friend’s arms. He’d told their story in faltering words until Harry knew what had nearly come to pass, until he was crying alongside them. Then Draco had dragged her to the Ministry, guided her through the paperwork to terminate her leave of absence and deposited her on the appropriate lift with Luna in tow.

She’d slowly begun to move through the motions, at first simply to do something, and then because her cases were interesting. The dreams had started coming less frequently, the foreign torments more memory than harsh reality until one day she woke and felt like Hermione Granger, Ravenclaw, Hogwarts Head Girl and most valuable member of the Department of Mysteries instead of a ravaged war veteran manipulated into a marriage with a boy who made her soul sing and shrivel in equal measure.

Hermione had started living again, going out with coworkers and friends, smiling so much her cheeks hurt, but Draco hadn’t moved out. They were united now, inseparable by even the depths of time and space.

One late afternoon as snow fell in heavy blankets over the London streets Harry had commented, “So you and Draco are for real, aren’t you?”

She’d shifted in her chair to face him, her feet dangling over one of the voluptuous arms. “You heard the story.”

“Well, yeah,” he’d replied, lips twisting in the shadow of a wince. She hadn’t begrudged him the reaction; the story wasn’t pretty. “But just because those things happened in some alternate time stream doesn’t mean that you’d feel the same way about him. I mean you’re not attached to Tom Riddle anymore.”

She’d swallowed heavily, not quite able to meet Harry’s luminous emerald eyes. The disturbing truth was that she wasn’t unattached to Tom Riddle either. While the pain the other girl had felt, the shadow of love that had laid the foundation for the bond between her and the boy who had broken them both, were not her own, she could feel the echo of the emotions in her soul. Draco had kept the time turner he’d found in his pocket; she’d kept her wedding ring.

“That life is more than just a memory to us.”

Harry had blinked, concern distorting his gentle features. “I thought you were moving on.”

Hermione’s smile had been bittersweet. “I am, Harry. I know this is my life and that none of that happened to me. None of that pain is mine to bear, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a part of me. That doesn’t mean I’m not in love with Draco.”

“In love?” Harry had parroted, eyes wide.

She’d laughed, the sound gentle and full of unfettered joy. “Not all of it was terrible. What she found with Draco, it’s something both of us still feel. We might not have felt this way without those memories, but neither of us is changing our mind.”

He’d scrubbed a hand through his wild hair, especially unkempt since he’d just come from Quidditch practice. “I didn’t realize it was so serious.”

“We’ve been living together for nearly six months, Harry.”

“I know,” he’d sighed. “I know. It’s just after Astoria died, I wasn’t sure Draco was going to make it. Her death really did a number on him and he refused to share the pain with any of us. I’m lucky I got him to talk to me, to come out of his shell. I just don’t want to see him moving on too quickly, especially with you. You two were never all that close.”

Hermione hadn’t known whether to be offended or amused by his protective attitude toward Draco. “Astoria died years ago, Harry. And I’m not taking advantage of him. We went through something together. Not just what happened in the memories, but also in dealing with them. There’s a connection we share that is deeper than anything I ever imagined. We understand each other so well; we’re closer than I thought it possible for two people to be. So you’re going to have to deal with us.”

He’d cracked a crooked smile, raising his hands in mock surrender. “Okay, okay, Hermione. I just worry about him. About both of you.”

She’d let out an amused huff and turned back to the book in her hands. “I appreciate that, Mr. Potter, but we are both adults and can manage just fine.”

They’d moved into a bigger flat the next spring and then into a small country estate in the fall. By the Ministry Yule Ball, there was a very impressive ring on her finger and a wedding to plan.

Hermione had worn green to the occasion—a severe aversion to red dresses permanently etched into her psyche. Draco had been resplendent in well-tailored dress robes, his hair shorn to just beneath his chin, giving him a roguish edge she’d always found irresistible. His eyes had gleamed pure silver as they’d rounded the dance floor together, the steps of the waltz coming as easily to them now as they had in shared memory.

The sense of déjà vu had become extreme when Dumbledore had halted them, gesturing for both to follow him to the edge of the grand ballroom. Her breath had caught unsteadily in her throat, but Draco’s assuring grip on her waist had kept most of the rising anxiety at bay.

Dumbledore’s eyes had sparkled over his half-moon glasses as he’d stared at each of them in turn. “I hear congratulations are in order.”

“Yes, Professor,” she’d replied, unease still fluttering beneath her skin. “Thank you.”

“I sincerely hope these nuptials are more successful than you last.”

Hermione had blanched while Draco went rigid at her side. His voice had been pure ice, an echo of the boy she’d never known, when he’d spoken. “Excuse me, Professor?”

“So you do remember,” Dumbledore had murmured, gaze flittering between them. “You must understand, I lived those months at Hogwarts all those years ago. I had begun to suspect that perhaps you had not. In all the years you were in school, neither of you showed any sign of knowing what had come to pass in 1943 and 1944.”

Hermione hadn’t known what to say. Hadn’t felt the truth of the memories so sharply in months. Her voice had been a breathless whisper as she’d sputtered, “It was real?”

“Very real. For a long time, I wondered what had become of Tom and both of you. It was only much later, in one of my visits with Gellert in the later days of his incarceration, that he told me the whole story. Or at least as much of it as he knew. Even he didn’t know exactly how Tom had died, only that he’d found the boy’s body in his study as the two of you disappeared with a Time Turner about your necks. It was rather unsettling the day you both arrived at Hogwarts and I realized just how far back you’d traveled.” There hadn’t been any judgment in his tone, but the revelation had shaken her. For the entire time she’d attended Hogwarts, her Headmaster had known exactly what she—or at least a version of her—had done.

“You knew and you didn’t warn us?” Draco had looked one incorrect word away from total fury.

“Time is a tricky thing, Mr. Malfoy, and I had no idea what any interference on my part would yield. As uncouth as it may be to admit, I preferred the world without Tom Riddle in it and I was not about to do anything to undo the changes you had wrought. I felt silence the best option.” His glasses had slipped further down his nose as he’d stared Draco down. “I imagine you are now aware of the complexity of the choices we make.”

Hermione had felt the zing of betrayal as she’d heard those words, but also the cold clarity of understanding. He’d made a decision for the greater good. Just as he always had, no matter what dimension they lived within.

“The Draco Malfoy you knew in the past was a better man than you ever knew.” It had seemed important that Dumbledore understand he did not know every detail of their lives. “I know you thought him the worst, but he wasn’t. He’d been put in an impossible situation and made a choice, a complex choice.”

Draco had sucked in a breath beside her, but hadn’t interceded. Dumbledore’s weighty gaze had settled on her a long moment before shifting to Draco. “I suppose in that, I do owe you an apology, Mr. Malfoy. The truth became clear when I leaned from Gellert of your role in Hermione’s escape from Tom Riddle and his subsequent demise.”

“No offense, Professor, but I’m not him. The expiration date on that apology has long passed.” He’d gathered Hermione to his side and bestowed a cool scowl upon their former headmaster. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a dance to finish with my fiancé.”

“Mr. Malfoy, Ms. Granger,” Dumbledore had demurred before adding, “I trust you won’t be sharing the true depths of this… adventure with anyone. The Ministry has strict laws in regards to the alteration of time and both of you are guilty of a slew of infractions that would likely land you in Azkaban for life.”

Draco’s fingers had dug into her hip as he’d growled, “Thank you, Professor, I believe you have done enough.”

“I am only looking out for you, Mr. Malfoy.”

“I think by now we have proved we are more than capable of looking out for ourselves, Professor. Now please, let us go. Let this go,” Hermione had implored before letting Draco turn her away. They’d spent the rest of the night dancing and trying to come to terms with just how real the foreign memories had been. It still hadn’t been their lives, but it had been their world.

Time had run away from them as the years passed, their lives in the present eating away the painful shadows of the past until the bitter memories felt as stale as any others, simply a piece of a life that had not been her own. They did not forget, but they did not bend under the force of impossible truths anymore. They lived, they loved, they welcomed new life.

It was watching Aurelia—some things deserved to be remembered, not forgotten—run through their vast garden, picking flowers and dancing with imaginary fairy princesses, that Hermione had realized she was ready. The ring had sat in a box buried in the bottom of her wardrobe, untouched, but not entirely forgotten for nearly a decade. But now it was time; time to find him and let it all go. For her daughter, for her husband and most of all for herself.

Her hand flattened against the stone, her body pitching forward until her forehead met the chilled marble. Draco’s hand tightened against her shoulder as he dropped to kneel beside her.

“Hello, Tom.”

There was a pulse of warmth against her skin, there and gone so quickly it could have been a product of her imagination. The leaves shifted, a sudden breeze catapulting them into the air. Hermione shivered, but didn’t waver.

“I don’t know if you can hear me. I imagine maybe you can, wherever you are. I don’t know what happens when we die, Tom, but I know you didn’t stay. You would have haunted me until I flung myself off the nearest cliff.” She sighed, fingers tracing his name again. “Or maybe you wouldn’t have. I can’t understand what happened at the end. I didn’t live it; I didn’t make any of those decisions. I wasn’t there, not really. But I do know my life wouldn’t have been possible without you. In a really twisted way, you actually gave me the chance to have a better life. To be free, just like you wanted.”

Her free hand rose to clasp Draco’s, his answering sigh the strength she needed to continue. She reached into her pocket, the golden wedding band heavy in her palm. She set it gently atop the stone, the metal luminous against the time-ravaged marble. “This should be with you. It certainly isn’t mine. I’m not her. I know that beyond a doubt now. But you helped make me possible, so I wanted acknowledge that. You were terrible to her, to so many people, but you did let her go and I’ll remember that.”

Hermione shifted, brushing a kiss across the pale stone before murmuring, “this where we end, Tom Riddle.”

There was no answering pulse of warmth, no sign that her words had affected anything but the air itself. Hermione let out a shuddering breath then pushed to her feet. Draco’s strong arms wrapped around her, drawing her away from the grave, away from the haunting memories of another girl, another life. No pull lingered as they walked away, no sense that she could find the marker without reading a single name again.

He waited to speak until they’d stepped outside the grounds. “How does it feel?”

“Like her fight is over. Finally.”

He brushed a soft kiss across her temple before dipping his head to claim her lips with his own. Hermione melted into him, surrendering to the familiar comfort of his caress. They stood, wrapped up together until her chilled lips tingled with his heat. Draco smiled down at her, his eyes warm, the storms chased away long ago.

“I love you Hermione Granger Malfoy.”

“I know,” she smirked and pressed another heated kiss against his lips. “Come on, we have a daughter to feed.”

Sighing, he held out a hand. “Indeed, we do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't even know what to say here. I don't want it to be the end. I'm also so very pleased with how this story has been received. It is on its way to becoming my most viewed (if not most Kudos'ed) story on AO3. So thank you, amazing readers, for taking a chance on me and this story. I write the ideas I just can't get out of my head, but it makes it so much sweeter when you guys love them too.
> 
> I don't have anything specific planned for the future, but as I've said in the comments, I have a couple ideas floating around in my head. I know I definitely want to write more Tom Riddle. He has such unexplored depths and I would like to plumb them all. As for Draco and Hermione, they are my home fandom, so I imagine I'll never truly be done writing stories about them. We'll see. Only time will tell.


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